What a huge subject salad leaves is, and it’s growing. A few years ago a British salad might have been a rather limited affair. Limp lettuce leaves, a few slices of soggy tomato and a radish. Distinctly unappetizing. Now all that has changed with the introduction of a huge range of unfamiliar leaves, roots, fruits and shoots.

Some old-fashioned lettuces, like ‘Cos’ and ‘Webbs Wonderful’ have a wonderful crunchy taste, but have to be picked whole when they are ready. Cut-and-come-again have taken over, offering delicious leaves over a period of months. And constantly picking leaves from the likes of ‘Salad Bowl’ and ‘Oak Leaf, rather than lifting the whole plant, keeps them immature. Consequently two or three sowings should last a whole summer, right into autumn.

Decorative pots or containers make excellent ‘gardens’ for cut-and-come-again crops, but lettuce is just the start of it. There are a host of other salad leaves – chicory, endive, claytonia, sorrel and spinach -that can be used in this way. Rocket has become a regular item on supermarket shelves, but leaves straight from the garden with a drizzle of olive oil and shaved Parmesan is another experience. And of course eating fresh leaves full of vitamins and minerals is the best possible diet.

One of the best salads is a good mesclun mix. Mesclun has no essential ingredients but, as it has always been understood in France, is an elegant mixture of young leaves, according to what is available, but always perfectly balanced so that no one ingredient dominates. The contents may be any or all of the following: baby lettuce, rocket, lamb’s lettuce, endive and chervil. Keeping to the spirit of mesclun, a modern mix might include other leaves, perhaps Chinese and Japanese mustards, mizuna and mibuna. All are fast-growing and have various degrees of heat. Although many mustards run to seed very quickly, mizuna and mibuna do not. Just pick them regularly to maintain fresh supplies.

Related posts:

1. Growing Salad Leaves in Your Garden

2. How to Grow Lettuce in Your Garden

3. Growing Perennials in Your Garden – Second Chances

4. Growing Vegetables in Pots

5. Growing Perennials in Your Garden

6. Growing Beetroots in Your Garden

7. How to Prevent Problems When Growing Lettuces

8. Growing Fruit and Vegetables in the Garden – The Basic

9. How to Make Vinaigrette

10. How to Select Vegetables in Container Gardens