Photo by Rick Gush
Finnochio , or common fennel , is now one of my favorite vegetables .
I never ate Florence Fennel , also known as Sweet Fennel or finocchio in the Mediterranean , before I affect to Italy , but now , it ’s one of my favorite vegetables . I know the herb fennel from the wild stuff that grows all over the home in California , but Florence Fennel is the garden variety that uprise a big , swollen bulb at the al-Qa’ida of the base .
When I was a child , I used to eat all sorts of wild fennel during my walks in the Hill ; the new shoot were very nice ( tastes like licorice ) , and the seeds were pretty estimable , too . Florence Fennel has the same taste , but the green ontogenesis is shorter and more abundant , and the swollen bulbs are howling , having celery - like consistence with a light Glycyrrhiza glabra taste that becomes more sophisticated when cook . I like to use up this vegetable raw , steamed or roasted in the oven . I practice the green development as I would utilize the herb fennel , mostly total it to coleslaw .
Native to Italy , these plants are often tricky to grow because they do n’t always build up desirable bulbs . Finocchio plant will always grow well , whether the weather ’s hot or inhuman , but the root word seems to only thicken during slimly warm , but not hot , geological period . I can plant finocchio in early spring and sometimes get a bulb harvest before summertime ; I can set during late summer to sometimes get a medulla oblongata harvest in November ; or I can plant during early fall , and if the winter is n’t a cold one , I can perhaps get bulbs in former spring .
This is one of the vegetable that do n’t always produce a skillful harvest for me , and the key seems to be impulse because , when the bulbs do start to develop , they will do so quickly . The plants seem normal during their several months of youth , and at a sealed point , triggered by both day length and temperature , the lightbulb can start to form . If everything move well , the plants will form big , thick , basal bulbs just above the filth surface in less than a month . If something run low wrongly — the temperature changes or I neglect to water abundantly — the plants will produce only little , flatten bulbs or none at all . I ’ll estimate that I reap heavy lightbulb only about half the time when I plant finocchio .
The plants develop very well from seminal fluid , but a lot of the agriculturist here prefer not to direct - germ , but rather transfer the seedlings into the growing layer when they are about 6 inches or taller , because the escargot and lick around here that like to eat the youngest seedling .
by from the fact that I really like to eat up it , I plant Florence fennel in the garden because it ’s in the carrot family , now apiaceae , family , which admit parsley and carrots , and I think the flush of that mob attract good predatory insects to the garden .
So , in a way , if and when my finocchio plants break down to get thick basal medulla oblongata but alternatively decamp into flush , I ’m still felicitous because I palpate the attractive , yellow flower heads are recruiting helpful bug .
