SALAD MIX

Bronze Arrowhead - This Arrowhead scores a bullseye for form and color, developing a gorgeous oakleaf rosette in a dance of green and bronze. Introduced as Bronze Beauty by the Germania Seed & Plant Co, this bronze was given a bronze by the AAS judges in 1947. A good variety for mesclun and cut and come again culture. Very slow to bolt. 

Salad Bowl - Bright-green frilly notched leaves form compact rosette. Stands heat better than Black Seeded Simpson, but at its best in cool weather, not summer. 1952 AAS bred by Ross Thompson of the USDA.   

Red Salad Bowl -  Compact frilly rosettes of spectacular bronzered oakleaves. Red at tips and on young growth, green at the base of the leaves. Nice buttery flavor. One of our most popular lettuces. A staple mesclun ingredient. Grows quite large in cool weather, but prone to bitterness and bolting in heat. Introduced in 1955.  

Green Deer Tongue - Also known as Matchless, this venerable heirloom goes all the way back to the 1740s. One of the only deer tongues you will ever want to see in your garden! Characteristic thick green pointed leaves radiating from a compact center. Slow to bolt. Has a rich nutty flavor that doesn’t turn bitter. “Hearty, light, fun in the mouth,” says our trialer.  

Really Red Deer Tongue - We revered the old Red Deer Tongue for its history and its classic leaf shape, but not for its pallid color and vulnerability to diseases. Frank Morton combined the old-timer with his own creation, Hyper Red Rumple Waved, to develop a whole series of Really Red breeding lines. Morton has re-selected his gene pool for the deep red color, pronounced white-green contrasting veins and characteristic pointed deer tongue leaves that attracted us initially. Now a more finished variety with much less variation, a stunning  improvement over the original Red Deer Tongue.  

Blushed Butter Oaks -  This 1997 Fedco introduction, one of a new class of lettuces developed by Frank Morton, aroused immediate interest. Best described as a compact oakleaf butterhead, with a delightful combination of pink and green colors and a buttery taste, Blushed Butter Oaks was a hit with everyone who saw it or sampled it at our trial.  

Les Oreilles du Diable (Devil’s Ears) - One of the lovely rare treasures once maintained by the Abundant Life Seed Foundation. A standout in our plots where we greatly preferred it to the relatively pallid Red Deer Tongue. This is deer tongue with real color and

good heat tolerance. Starlike rosettes of tasty glossy leaves are deeply tinged with burgundy for a shimmery appearance. We (Fedco Seeds) enjoyed its nutty texture and bitter-free flavor. One of the last to bolt. Certified biodynamically grown. 

Speckled Amish - An ornamental bibb of spectacular beauty, its apple-green leaves splashed with maroon flecks. A stunner in your garden or salad. Makes small firm mild-flavored heads shaped like Merveille des Quatre Saisons, centers with soft leaves blanching creamy yellow. Mennonites brought seed in a covered wagon from Lancaster County, PA, to Ontario in 1799. Introduced into commerce in 1880 as Golden Spotted. Frank Morton, who got the stock seed from the Seed Savers Exchange, has been selecting to alleviate tipburn.  

Wunder von Stuttgart - A wonder indeed, elegant and enormous in Loon Song Farm’s trial where it reached 1' in diameter in the heat of summer while retaining all the qualities we love in a classy butterhead. Equally impressive, if only slightly more subdued, in Shooting Star Farm’s fall plot, where the shiny dark green ruffled rounded leaves were sweet, buttery and chewy. Donna Dyrek calls it “larger and better than Nancy.” Light medium-green.  

Forellenschluss - Called by Lisa Bloodnick “the Jackson Pollack of lettuces.” Also known as Freckles or Trout Back, an heirloom from Arche Noah, the Austrian genetic preservation project. An absolutely gorgeous romaine with the delicate taste and texture of a butterhead, distinguished for its deep green leaves flecked with wine-red splotches. Lately we’ve seen increasing variation in the coloration and degree of splotching. “The best-tasting lettuce I’ve grown…can give a large heavy head as sweet as can be,” praises Michael Goldman. Also the best-tasting of the 50 lettuces in our 1998 trial. Very buttery tender leaves may be harvested at 4-6" for mesclun or allowed to grow full size for maximum ornamental benefit. William Woys Weaver traced Forellenschluss back to 1793; it was a dwarf variety of Spotted Aleppo developed in Germany.  

Majestic Red - Fancy savoyed rich bronze-red leaves make Majestic positively gorgeous. Cylindrical “head” has somewhat spreading habit. One of the slowest-bolting romaines in our trial and much in demand in recent years. Developed by Sunseeds.  

Parris Island Cos - The standard market romaine developed by Clemson University and the USDA in 1952. Upright 8–9" heads fold inward to form compact centers. Interior greenish-white. Resistant to tipburn and bolting, even in heat. Irrigation improves its texture. One grower praised its rapid emergence in his pre-sprouting setup. Cos is an island in the Dodecanese region of Greece where this type of lettuce was named. Parris Island is in South Carolina.  

Michelle - One of these years we’re gonna have a real summah, one that starts in May and never looks back. When we do, you’re going to want Michelle to be your belle, because she can bear that heat. She was absolutely the last to bolt in our 2006 observation plot, still standing on Aug. 12, even after a miserable heat wave. She is also reluctant to tipburn. Almost a dead ringer for Sierra, Michelle is a red batavian type, mostly green in the summer, with more tinges of red in the cool temperatures of spring and fall. Delicious without the faintest hint of bitterness and very crunchy.  

Pablo - Pablo bears a superficial resemblance to a red iceberg with much the same allure, but is a batavian, not a crisphead. Its larger plants form loose heads of beautiful upright rosettes surrounded by wide wavy-edged flat leaves. Bronze coloration on the outside leaves contrasts strongly with the green interiors lending a striking metallic sheen. Very sweet and mild with some bitterness in the ribs, slow-growing and extremely heat resistant. Always one of the last five to bolt in my extensive lettuce trials—sweet to the bitter end. Lovely enough to stand as an ornamental, but also one of the best-tasting in the patch. From Seed Savers Exchange.  

Anuenue - Johnny’s deserves credit for popularizing Anuenue. Its mellifluous Hawaiian name (pronounced AH-new-ee-new-ee) means ‘rainbow’ even though it is a uniform dark green. How could I have overlooked Anuenue for so long? Well, it sure doesn’t look like much in June when most other lettuce is in full glory, but as the days get shorter and the heat gets stronger it really comes into its own. In late July and even early August, this 1987 University of Hawaii product has no peers for crispness and sweetness, and I will never again be without it for first-rate midsummer salads. Slow growth is its secret. It remains compact as it matures, surrounding its round tightly-packed heart with crisp outer leaves. There is never the faintest hint of bitterness.  

Ice-Bred Arugula – Brett Grohsgal crossed two excellent European heirloom strains in 1989 and has been selecting for cold-hardiness and vigor since. He’s bred one tough cookie here. Mid-ribs and whole leaves develop a lovely purple hue in winter freezes. Recovers in spring even if plant goes dormant under very cold conditions. Seedlings can stand drought, compete against weeds and don’t require high soil fertility. This is arugula with more bite, vigorous with complex full flavors. 

Arugula - The best-tasting and most bolt-resistant of the 11 strains we (Fedco Seeds) trailed in 2006.  

Bright Lights Swiss Chard - Johnny’s Selected Seeds won its second All-America award for making swiss chard commercially available in a rainbow of colors. Bright Lights bathes stems, midribs and secondary veins in a panoply of gold, yellow, orange, pink, intermediate pastels and dazzling stripes. The AAS judges were impressed by the tenderness of its dark green to bronze leaves and the mildness of its chard flavor. Young seedlings respond to cut-and-come-again culture, ideal for mesclun. Bright Lights was developed by John Eaton of Lower Hutt, New Zealand, who found the parent plants, a red one and a yellow one, in a small home garden in 1977 and crossed them to standard green and white varieties, selecting for color and flavor over the next fifteen years. Johnny’s worked the following years to preserve the strength and range of the individual colors.  

Fordhook Giant Swiss Card - Broad white stems, leaves dark green and savoyed with white veins. The standard variety, introduced by Burpee in 1934. Strains of green swiss chard have been around since 1750.