Wild Cabbage
Brassica oleracea
Wild Cabbage has been an important human food crop, used because of its large leafy food reserves stored over the winter. It is rich in essential nutrients, including Vitamin C. In Greek and Roman times it was a well-established garden vegetable. In our gardens, this plant has grown to a towering 8′ tall with massive 2’ to 3’ long leaves. It is a delicious collard-like sauté vegetable.
Water: Moderate
Hardiness: Frost Hardy
Habit: A hardy, tall, biennial to short-lived perennial that forms a stout rosette of large leaves in the first year. In its second year, it uses stored nutrients to produce flower spikes 3’ to 7' tall.
Light: Full Sun
Soil: Average, but will grow to Jurassic proportions in rich soil
Origin: Coastal Southern and Western Europe