Cauliflower
Pantry
Cauliflower
Created: Sep 25, 2008
User: SummerJ
Last Edit: Sep 26, 2008
Edited By: Anonymous
Pantry Url:
http://www.foodea.com/pantry/cauliflower
Summary
Cauliflower is the aristocrat of the cabbage (Brassica) family. This family includes leafy kales and collards, Brussels sprouts, heading cabbages (pointed, round, and “drumhead”), sprouting broccolis, and kohlrabi.
General Information
The proper growing of cauliflower demands much attention to details:
It needs wet, heavy soil (but neither too wet nor too heavy). Anything that could retard its growth – insufficient water, cold or hot weather, insect pressure, or insufficient fertilization – will prevent proper heading.
After the heads begin to form, the leaves need to be tied around the growing white curds to blanch them to pure white and to prevent frost damage. Finally, the head needs to be harvested at just the right time. Small heads are the result of slowed growth, but with the current interest in “baby” vegetables, some growers now grow the plants very close together to force smaller heads called “buttons.”
All of these details made cauliflower a luxury in previous centuries. But now it is considered to be a very common vegetable. Recent breeding, cheap water, vast arrays of insecticides, precision chemical fertilization, and growing them in steadily cool areas of California, have all contributed to converting this former luxury into something nearly mundane.
Cultivation
Cauliflowers demand cool, wet, fertile conditions. For this reason, at Cookstown we concentrate on growing this crop during our long autumns; spring is usually too short. To get a good start, we prepare bedding plants in a protected, cool, shaded area. Starting in early August, we begin setting out plants to finish growing from late September until early November.
While the weather is hot and dry, tiny flea beetles love to chew on the leaves, leaving many “buckshot” holes. When the plants are large enough, this is merely a cosmetic problem. A more annoying pest first appears as lovely white butterflies flitting around the garden. They find plants in the cabbage family on which to lay their eggs. These turn into the hungry green caterpillars that can lurk in cauliflower heads. The safest way to be free of them is to spray on Bt (bacterium thurengensis), which is a natural bacterium available at most garden centres and is considered quite harmless to everything except caterpillars. If you find cauliflower heads harbouring these green caterpillars, soak them in a bowl of salted water for fifteen minutes and the caterpillars will float away.
Conventionally grown brassicas are among the most heavily sprayed vegetables. So if you choose to minimize eating such produce, selecting organically grown specimens would be advisable.
