Butterhead Lettuce Rigoletto - Lactuca sativa

The Rigoletto Cos Lettuce is an improved variety of Attractie that produces beautiful heads of tender leaves. Its heat resistance and resistance to running to seed make it an easy variety to grow from spring to autumn. It can be sown from February to July for a harvest 8 to 10 weeks later.

Lettuce is one of the most popular vegetables (with a consumption of 4.2 kilograms per person per year), appreciated for its freshness, crunchiness, as well as its taste and nutritional qualities. It can be consumed raw in salads but also cooked, for example, to accompany peas.

As the quintessential leaf vegetable, Lettuce is an annual plant that belongs to the large Asteraceae family. Its Latin name, Lactuca sativa, refers both to the white sap (lactuca) that flows when it is cut and to the fact that it is cultivated (sativa).

It is an essential vegetable in any respectable vegetable garden, and there are so many varieties that it can be grown almost all year round.

Growing Lettuce is easy as long as you respect the planting calendar for each variety. It grows quickly and thrives in any soil, as long as it is rich and remains moist.

Harvest: It is simply done with a knife when the Lettuces are well developed.

Storage: Lettuce can be stored for a few days in the refrigerator, but to enjoy its freshness to the maximum, we recommend consuming it right after harvesting. Freezing cooked Lettuce is also possible.

Gardener's tip: A true nightmare for gardeners, slugs and snails love lettuce leaves. When the hunt is on, it must be admitted that one is ready to do anything to repel or eliminate them: the ash cord (which will be quickly leached by the rains), the homemade trap filled with beer (which hedgehogs drink until they are intoxicated), the copper strips that are supposed to electrocute them (which tickle them a little).

Instead of wasting your time and, incidentally, your salads, we recommend using an anti-slug product composed of ferric phosphate known as Ferramol. Unlike metaldehyde-based slug control products, which are dangerous to wildlife and polluting, Ferramol is natural, non-toxic, and very effective as long as you remember to "treat" your plot a few days before sowing.