Cauliflower Vitaverde F1

The 'Vitaverde F1' Cauliflower is an early variety distinguished by its green head colour. This good-tasting Cauliflower is vigorous and can be harvested very early. It can be sown from January to June for a harvest from June to mid-September.

In recent years, cauliflower has been innovating in terms of colour. We have moved on to yellow, orange, or purple from the beautiful, immaculate white. Vitaverde is a green variety. Cauliflower is a flower vegetable, and its fleshy meristem is consumed. It belongs to the large Brassicaceae family (formerly crucifers) and bears the Latin name Brassica oleracea botrytis. Sometimes called Cypriot cabbage, cauliflower is a biennial vegetable plant originally from China.

Consumed for the first time in Germany only 300 years ago, this vegetable has earned a special place in our kitchens as it lends itself to many preparations. It can be eaten raw in salads or cooked, plain, in gratins with béchamel sauce, or accompanied by a curry sauce that complements its flavour very well. It is a low-calorie vegetable and rich in vitamin C. There are many varieties of cauliflower, each with a distinct growing period that should be respected. You can have this vegetable all year round by carefully choosing your seeds.

Cauliflower is a demanding vegetable that requires excellent organic matter and regular moisture.

Harvest: Cauliflower is harvested when its head is compacted by cutting it at ground level.

Storage: Cauliflower does not keep very well. It is best to consume it quickly after harvesting. It can be kept in the refrigerator for a few days. You can also freeze it after blanching it for 3 minutes in salted boiling water.

Gardener's tip: The main enemy of cauliflower is the cabbage white butterfly (Pieris brassicae), a beautiful creamy white butterfly with small black spots whose caterpillars emerge from April-May to wreak havoc on the leaves of different cabbages. While spraying a solution based on Bacillus thuringiensis is an acceptable curative measure, we prefer, in our garden, to opt for prevention by installing an insect-proof mesh tightly over arched frames. These meshes are easy to set up and reusable to protect, for example, your carrot and leek crops.

NB: This variety is labelled F1 for "F1 hybrid" because it results from the cross-breeding of carefully selected parents to combine their qualities. This results in a variety that can be exceptionally flavorful and early while resistant to certain diseases. Sometimes criticised or wrongly associated with GMOs, F1 hybrid seeds are attractive for their uniformity and resistance. Still, unfortunately, their qualities do not pass on to the next generations: it will, therefore, not be possible to recover the seeds for later sowing.