Homegrown: Curly kale
It adds flavour, colour and texture to any dish
Handsome to look at and simple to grow, ‘Pentland Brig’ is a special heirloom ‘cut and come again’ variety. It has a sweet, nutty flavour and tender, frilly, mid-green leaves. Like sprouting broccoli, it produces sideshoots in spring after the main winter crop, which you can eat, even when it has started to flower.
Use baby leaves, which can be sown on the windowsill all year round, in salads. You can sow a mature crop outdoors in spring, or indoors in modules, before planting out in summer. Net it against rabbits and birds, and harvest from autumn through winter.
The mild flavour and delicate leaf texture make ‘Pentland Brig’ ideal for these two recipes.