A Detailed Guide to the Nutritional Value of Sow Thistle and How to Grow and Care for Curly Endive

Today we introduce a wild vegetable from the countryside. Its name is sow thistle, and older people also call it the longevity vegetable; it is a food that is both a medicine and a food. Curly endive is usually most common in mountainous areas. As a wild vegetable it can feed livestock, and people can also cook and eat it. Because it is itself very rich in protein, vitamins, minerals and other nutrients, its tender leaves can be picked and eaten raw, or served as a cold salad, made into soup or stir-fried.

Curly endive belongs to the genus Cichorium in the aster family (Asteraceae), and when grown its plant height is about 50 to 100 cm. On the flower market you can usually only buy seeds. When sowing, it is best to choose cooler weather; if you sow in the high temperatures of summer, be careful to place it outside a north-facing window, and it can still grow well. In terms of care, curly endive likes a cool, humid climate and is cold-hardy, able to tolerate a low temperature of minus three degrees; it does not tolerate high temperatures, and once the ambient temperature soars to 30°C it may wither. The optimal growing temperature is 15 to 25°C. For soil-grown plants, the best soil is a well-drained clay loam.

The trick to sowing curly endive is to first water the soil thoroughly before sowing. Wait until the water has been absorbed and drained down, then evenly scatter the seeds over the growing medium, and afterwards cover them with 0.5 cm of fine soil. During the 3 to 5 days before the seedlings emerge, keep the soil temperature and moisture up; once the seedlings emerge, transplant them into pots, with a spacing of about 20 to 25 cm between seedlings.

In daily care, if you give curly endive plenty of light, the bitterness will be stronger once it grows; if you cannot take the bitterness, then shade it to reduce the bitterness. As for water, it fears drought and not wetness, so especially during the growing season you should frequently check how moist the soil is. If the soil stays dry for a long time, it will cause the curly endive to develop more fiber and its quality will be greatly reduced. As for fertilizing, during the growing season apply a nitrogen fertilizer once every 7 to 10 days along with watering.

Curly endive has high nutritional value. About 40 to 50 days after sowing, the leaf rosette enters its period of vigorous growth, and this is the most suitable time to harvest. When picking, be careful not to strip the whole plant bare at once; you can pick only the outer leaves to eat, and in this way it will go on growing even more leaves afterwards.