Planting rocket
All of the Don family love rocket, specially in spring when the leaves are super tender and buttery in texture with enough heat to add flavour but not so much as to dominate all else. I am talking about the annual rocket, Eruca vesicaria, which is so much better to eat than the perennial ‘wild’ rocket Diplotaxis tenuifolia, which I also grow but which is altogether coarser, both in texture and flavour.
I always sow a batch of rocket seeds at the very beginning of the year. I prick out the seedlings into plugs and grow them on in coldframes until the soil is warm enough to plant them out, just as the days are warming up and the light is stretching out. They will then grow fast – which is the key to really good rocket – without going to seed.
We will take a couple of generous harvests from each plant before they start to become coarse and go to flower in May. Then I ruthlessly consign the flowering plants to the compost heap and replace them with another crop. I will sow another batch in late July, to catch the cooler weather of early autumn.