Spinacia oleracea
Monstrueux de Viroflay Spinach: this heirloom variety, developed in the 19th century in the market-gardening plain of Viroflay to supply Paris, takes its name from its enormous leaves — they can exceed 25 cm. A single handful fills the saucepan, making it the most productive spinach in the vegetable garden.
Characteristics:
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Enormous leaves: thick, tender and dark green, they are the variety's main claim to fame.
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Highly productive: one of the most generous varieties for a given area.
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Harvested raw or cooked: young leaves in salads, large leaves cooked.
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Hardy: it tolerates temperatures down to -10 °C, allowing winter harvests.
Sowing advice:
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Exposure: shaded in summer, sunny in autumn and winter. This is the key point: like all spinach, it bolts as soon as warm weather and long days arrive. Partial summer shade significantly delays this process.
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Soil: clay-rich, rich in humus and kept moist, preferably with a good nitrogen supply. An application of manure or well-rotted compost genuinely benefits it — it is a hungry vegetable. Soil that dries out immediately triggers bolting.
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Method: sow directly in place, 2 cm deep, in rows 25 cm apart. From February to mid-May for spring harvests, and from mid-August to November for autumn and winter harvests. Sow successively every two weeks. Avoid midsummer sowings, which bolt before they can be harvested. See how to sow your seeds.
Care advice:
- Thin to 15 cm apart. Water regularly and generously: keeping the soil constantly moist is the only real secret to growing this crop.
- Mulch the row to retain moisture and limit bolting.
Harvesting advice:
- Pick the outer leaves one at a time, leaving the center intact: the plant will then continue producing for weeks. Never cut the entire clump.
- As soon as the flower stalk appears, harvest everything: the leaves will then become bitter and tough.
Beneficial companion plants:
Benefits for biodiversity:
- Its dense cover protects the soil from drying out and erosion between two main crops.
- When dug in as green manure, it quickly returns organic matter and nourishes soil life. See living soil.
Uses:
- Young leaves raw in salads; large leaves with cream, in gratins, quiches and soups, or sautéed with garlic. They shrink considerably when cooked: plan generously.
Saving your own seeds:
Spinach is dioecious: keep several plants to ensure you have both male and female plants. Let them bolt, then harvest the seeds from the female plants when they turn brown. See saving your seeds.
Commitment to Quality: at SemiSauvage - Permaculture, we grow and select our seeds with respect for living things as our guiding principle. Based near the Auvergne Volcanoes, we choose open-pollinated, non-hybrid varieties, test them for germination rates, and carefully sort and package them without any chemical treatment. Our belief: to give gardeners back the ability to resow, year after year, seeds that truly belong to them.
An heirloom variety with giant leaves, the most productive in the vegetable garden.
