In My San Diego Garden and Kitchen

Mar 3

Mar 3 In My San Diego Garden and Kitchen

Here’s the orange cauliflower in my garden before cutting. It’s more like a bouquet set amidst the leaves—more attractive than sitting alone on my counter. It is also known as cheddar cauliflower and orange bouquet cauliflower. The color comes from a genetic mutation that allows the vegetable to hold more beta carotene making it a good source of vitamin A.

Orange cauliflower was first discovered in Canada in 1970, hybridized at Cornell and required many years of cross-breeding before it became commercially available. It is similar in texture to white cauliflower with only subtle differences in taste. Here’s the description from Specialty Produce. You’ll also find links to 15 recipes for orange cauliflower there.

Its flavor is mild with subtle cruciferous and nutty sweet nuances, a taste which is amplified when roasted. The entire cauliflower, its leaves, trunk, stems and florets are all edible.

This is the last Romanesco from the garden for this year. I’m so enamored with this chartreuse, fractal vegetable, I might plant more next year.

Romanesco was perfect in this yellow and green themed salad.

And continuing on the brassica theme, I cut the first of the broccoli side shoots this week. They seemed slow in coming, perhaps due to our cooler, rainy weather. The largest side shoot (in the 12 inch wooden bowl) was akin to a small head of broccoli

The snow peas like the cool weather and produce abundantly. Soon I’ll have to let them set seed for next year’s crop. I’ve been saving seed for the snow peas for over twenty years. They are very well adapted to my garden conditions. I’ll also be sharing some of my seed with San Diego Seed Company for further garden trials.