My Favorite Crispy Garden Lettuce: Iceberg types—for solid heads, start early

Too many people think head lettuce or Iceberg lettuce has to be bought at the market.

I grow wonderful crops of head lettuce and yet every year some new visitor looks at my bright green rows and says, “Hmmmm. I didn’t know you could grow that here.” Well, you can and it’s easy.

All you need is some cool weather in spring or fall. Get started early; head lettuce needs as much time as possible developing in cool weather, so the earlier you can set out some plants, the better. They will have the best chance to head up before the scorching days of summer.

Great Lakes, Iceberg, and Ithacavarieties have all done well in my garden. I start them indoors in shallow flats or pyramid planters about 6 to 8 weeks before the last expected frost date.

The most important step in early planting is to harden off the plants very well before setting them into the garden. After they are about 4 weeks old, I start giving them some time outdoors. That way they can handle unexpected cold snaps and even a light frost.

I may sound like a broken record by now, but head lettuce belongs in wide rows. When I set transpants out, I first prepare a wide row seedbed 20 inches wide. Then I set the plants 10 inches apart in a 3-2 pattern down the row, two at the edges and one in the middle in the first row. And two in the next row, each 5 inches in from the edges.

Lettuce roots recover quickly from transplant shock. To help them out a bit, I trim some of their outside leaves. Leave the center alone, of course. Don’t be afraid to set out even the smallest of transplants. If they have some decent roots, they’ll make it.

With so many plants in the wide row, you can afford to start harvesting as soon as the leaves are big enough to eat or the first heads are the size of softballs. You’ll get plenty of bigger heads later. After all, who needs a whole row of head lettuce at once? Start picking early!

Keep your head lettuce plants supplied with water as they head up.

Other lettuce favorites

Growing in wide rows helps me get more of the very flavorful Buttercrunch and Dark Green Boston lettuce. These are “soft head” varieties. They form a head, but it’s loose.

I sow the seeds directly in the garden early in the spring. (You can start some ahead of time inside if you like.) In a wide row they easily can come up too thickly to form a nice head, so it’s important to thin them out as they grow.

Once the row is thinned, you can harvest by cutting the heads an inch above the ground. A lot depends on the weather, but you may get a fine second cutting of leaves later.

The flavor of Black Seeded Simpson is probably my favorite among the leaf lettuce varieties. These varieties don’t produce heads, but they are ready to eat earlier, and they come back well after a crew cut harvest.

I like Oak Leaf, too, because it doesn’t get bitter as quickly in warm weather. I always include some Ruby leaf lettuce for color and taste in a salad. It looks beautiful in the garden.

Everyone should have a good supply of leaf lettuce seed on hand at all times. Plant short wide rows here and there in the garden through the season starting as early as you can. You’ll never be caught without enough salad greens for a small army.

Because Romaine doesn’t germinate as well as other types, I plant it a _lot_. thicker than the other varieties.

The plants produce heads 10 or more inches high, so they need a little room. Thin your wide rows as the plants reach 3 or 4 inches in height. Pull them as you need them until you have 6 or 8 inches between plants.

In the summer I pick lettuce from the garden minutes before serving. I wash it well and don’t chill it because it’s so fresh. If you need to store lettuce, wash it first, put it in a bowl, cover it with a damp towel, and put it in the refrigerator. It’ll stay crisp and fresh for days. Another way is to put the lettuce in plastic bags without tying up the bags, and store in the fridge.

I use pyramid planters for sure starts

The biggest obstacle to a fall crop of head lettuce is getting the plants off to a good start in late summer when it can be ferociously hot. The answer is to use pyramid planters.

I sow a couple of seeds in each compartment and then pinch out one after the plants are up. I keep the planting trays in a semi- shaded spot so they don’t dry out. When it is time to put the plants in the garden (after 3 weeks or so), I give them a good soaking.

Using my jackknife, I slide out a plant without disturbing its root system. This “bump-free” transfer to the garden means that all roots will be intact. The plant will be able to survive hot weather on its own.

Not the kind you put on hot dogs

Mustard is a cool-weather crop that can be used as a salad ingredient or as a cooked green, which I prefer. The seeds are so fine that you may want to sow them from a salt shaker to insure uniform seeding.

Mustard is great when planted in blocks because you can harvest so much for so little work. Mustard greens shrink a little when you cook them so you need quite a bit anyway.

Harvest mustard as soon as there is enough for a meal. Mustard planted in late summer for fall harvesting is tops. Cold weather and light frosts do much for improving mustard’s flavor. If winters are mild in your area, a late summer planting will yield greens all winter long.

Of course, you can plant mustard early each spring, too. In as little as 30 days or so, you can be harvesting young leaves. Green Wave and Tendergreen varieties give excellent results. Green Wave is peppery when raw. Tendergreen has a mellow flavor when cooked.

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