Florence fennel

Don’t like aniseed? Neither does JACKIE FRENCH. But she reckons the delicate, scented notes in fennel are something else, whether you eat the leaf shoots, the seeds or the bulbs

My husband Bryan and I ate fennel the other night. Flathead tails in a fennel batter (I added fennel seeds to the batter mix), with a green salad tossed with crisp shavings of fennel bulb. Bryan didn’t know he was eating fennel. I had just told him that the ‘fish and chips’ looked good. Bryan thinks he hates fennel, which is why I don’t let him know when he is eating it. He also hates black jelly babies and aniseed. Actually, so do I. But I still love fennel, which gives the lightest, most delicate touch of aniseed of all.

getting started

Fennel is gloriously easy to grow. Scatter seeds over your compost-improved soil and keep moist, then thin out the seedlings to about 30cm apart.

What happens then, if you don’t look after the seedlings, is that they bolt to seed. This doesn’t matter if it’s actually the seed you want to harvest, delicious in cakes and biscuits as well as in batter, or if you want to finely chop the leaves to add to everything from salads to fish sauces, or place a few sprigs inside a fish as you bake it.

But to get the true, fat, crisp fennel bulbs, fennel needs excellent feeding as well as regular watering. Drying out, or even fluctuating temperatures, can mean it bolts to seed without getting that good fat bulb. Even a stretch of hot weather can cause your fennel to go to seed, which is why it is best grown during mild conditions. This means early spring in cool to warm temperate areas so it matures before summer; and autumn in arid, tropical and subtropical areas. In wet, humid areas, it requires very well-drained soil, or the bulbs will rot.

In all areas, mulch deeply to stop weed competition, or mound the soil up around each bulb, to help keep the soil moist and temperature even. Managing rising temperatures can be a bit of a challenge – use shadecloth covers on super hot days and give them a misting to try to keep the temperature down. Don’t disturb the roots as you pull out weeds – this is another cause of bolting.

Fennel doesn’t attract major pests or diseases, and it is so fragrant it can be used in companion planting to disguise the scent of other vegies, such as cabbages. However, slugs and snails can eat the small plants, and slugs may feed on larger bulbs, especially if there has been a bit of damage from over-enthusiastic weeding or digging.

harvesting & cooking

Pick fennel bulbs as soon as they are large enough. Large ones grow twice as fat as a plump carrot, but smaller ones are crisp and delicious, too. Bulbs will toughen as soon as they start going to seed, so

don’t leave them too long in hot weather. They’ll last through winter, though, and not go to seed until spring. Rather than pull the whole bulb up, you can slice it off at the base and let the roots regrow soft leaf shoots that can then be chopped and used, although the plant won’t grow another bulb.

I like to use young or mature bulbs raw, shaved and scattered into a green salad or with baked fish. Slices are delicious sautéed slowly in olive oil until they are just brown, soft and caramelised. I also bake them whole in the oven with a little oil, or add them to a plain roast chook served with its juices.

To be truly luxurious, slice bulbs evenly, layer them in a dish, then cover with sour cream. Bake at 150˚C for two hours, until the cream is absorbed, the top crusty and the vegies soft and stupendous.

The tops are excellent chopped into salads or added to sandwiches (try with cheese). Or add a few branches to the middle of a baked fish, or bake the fish on a bed of fennel leaves or fennel slices. Add the seeds to the batter or make sugary toffee confections, or seedy cake – a butter cake with fennel seeds. Seedy biscuits are excellent, too.

Whatever you cook, make lots. It takes courage to try fennel – or a bit of ignorance in Bryan’s case. But he has just asked me, “Can we have that delicious fish again?” It may be time to confess what I’ve been feeding him.