Perennial veggies in the Midwest garden

Blood veined sorrel

Sunday, August 16, 2015

Have you heard of perennial vegetables?  Well, they do exist!  You plant them once and they grow back every year.  They are the first ones to show their faces in the spring and the last to die back in the fall.

The following are perennial vegetables in our Zone 6 in the Midwest:

French sorrel (pictured above already poking its head up), radicchio, chard, Good King Henry (spinach relative), chicory, salad burnet, rhubarb, sunchoke, daylily (yes, they are edible), ostrich fern, watercress, mountain sorrel, arrowhead, Welsh onion, Egyptian walking onion, potato onion, ramps, garlic chives, chives, groundnut, udo, asparagus, sea kale, jinenjo, Chinese yam, wood nettle, lovage, water celery, fuki, pokeweed, giant Solomon’s seal, ‘Profusion’ sorrel, silver shield sorrel, scorzonera, skirret, Chinese artichoke, dandelion, linden, nettles, ‘Western Front’ perennial kale, sylvetta arugula, Turkish rocket, Cusick’s camass, perennial sweet leek, yellow asphodel, saltbush, sea beet, ‘Tree Collards/Walking Stick Kale’, tropical tree kale, perennial broccoli (including ‘9 Star’), branching bush kale (including ‘Dorbenton’), wild cabbage, achira, taro and ‘Celery Stem’ tato, chufa, air potato, wolfberry, water lotus, fragrant spring tree, canebrake bamboo, skirret.

It is a long list.  Many are hard to find the seed for or a starter plant.  There are several that are easy to find, though!

Common chives in bloom

The ones I currently grow:

**French sorrel (good for soups, steamed or a salad green)

**Radicchio (good steamed, roasted or a salad green)

**Chard (good steamed or as a salad green)

**Good King Henry (spinach relative, use as a salad green)

**Salad burnett (taste somewhat like a Granny Smith apple, use fresh in salads)

**Egyptian walking onion (use fresh for cooking or salads)

**Perennial kale (good steamed or as salad green)

**Chives (salads or flavoring cream cheese, butter, sour cream, dips)

**Arugula (peppery flavor, great for salads)

**French and American dandelion (great for salads)

**Daylily (flower buds can be eaten like green beans, flowers in salads)

**Celery-not advertised as a perennial but ours is coming back for the third year.....

Another option for a plant 'em once are self seeding annuals. They drop seeds in the garden bed and sprout in the spring.  For more on them, 

Self-seeding crops, plant once and forget 'em