I know I sound like a geek….but it thrills me that our current salad mix contains a lettuce whose seed we saved on our farm. It’s one of 6 varieties of lettuce in the mix at the moment (we change up the lettuce varieties pretty often during the season). It’s called Italian Red Parella and it’s super cute and beautiful. It’s a sun-kissed, freckly beauty with a nice round shape.
We grew it for Annapolis Seeds 2 years ago and kept quite a bit of seed for ourselves so we could see how it fits in best with our crop plan and what qualities we want to select for in the future. We liked it as a full-head but, right now, I’m really loving it in our salad mix.
It’s really fun to fine-tune our salad mix each winter through the selections we make from various seed companies. But, it’s a whole other level for just one component of our salad mix to have been in the works for much longer. It’s definitely not our flashiest lettuce. I’m not sure if anyone eating the mix would point it out and say “how special is this one?” so I just wanted to mention it. It’s special.
I am eating your salad mix for lunch today for the first time and am absolutely loving it! It’s hard to find the right words to describe salad greens — so I’ll stick with “crisp and full of flavor”. I love the variety in the mix and can’t wait to pick up some more at next week’s farmers market in Dieppe. Thanks for all your hard work in growing this good stuff!
A happy Food Club member!
Truly an inspiration fr many