I wrote in this post in May, saying that we are trying some Molokhia (Egyptian Spinach) this year as a hot weather leafy green. It is recommended as a versatile, continuous-harvest vegetable that can survive both dry and wet conditions in warm or hot weather. Egyptian spinach is related to okra, mallow, roselle hibiscus (red sorrel, Jamaican sorrel), also cotton, cacao and durian. Okra is the only crop on that list that we have in our vegetable garden, so we had no worries about crop rotation.
We’ve had a couple of meals, and then accidentally mowed half the plot, which was hiding behind some enormous sorghum-sudangrass cover crop.
I sowed 50 cells on April 1, and transplanted them May 24, 12 (45 cm) apart in all directions. We hoed once and gave scraps of mulch, but the plants grew very quickly and weeds were no longer an issue. We did not give them much TLC. Not 2″-3″ (5-8 cm) of water a week as recommended: maybe 1″ (2.5 cm). We did not add any compost or nutrients throughout the season.
The 70 days to maturity, if from transplanting, takes us to the end of July. They were mature before that. If it’s 70 days from sowing, that’s only June 10. I wasn’t paying them good attention then, but with hindsight, I think it would have been good if I had snipped the tops off for a meal then. It would have helped the plants bush out at a lower level, giving more tender young leaves.
I didn’t make a first harvest until around July 12, by which point the plants were tall. Harvest takes a while, if you are going for 10 gallons, as I was. I used the method of cutting the upper 6″-8″ (7-10 cm) of growth with scissors and then stripping the leaves off in a cooler location. People with smaller households and milder temperatures might harvest individual leaves from the plants. Although I do think shortening the stems helps produce more leaves.
I made a second harvest around August 10 and took a survey. Our cook removed the individual leaves from the stems and steamed them lightly on their own. They were served alongside shiitake mushrooms, which some people mixed in, while others preferred the leaves on their own. Cooked this way they were not excessively mucilaginous as I had been mentally prepared for. Nine diners of those surveyed liked the molokhia and wanted us to grow it again. One said no and two said maybe.
By August 10, the plants were starting to flower, small yellow flowers emerging from the leaf axils. The pods could provide an additional tasty harvest, I’ve read. But we don’t have many pods and they do tend to hide among the leaves.
A pest that I didn’t find mentioned in the research I did is the Japanese beetle. The larger leaves were the ones attacked. It appears that molokhia is not their favorite food as many of the leaves were not attacked. Worth knowing about, if you are particularly plagued by Japanese beetles.
Photo Pam Dawling
If we had not reduced the number of plants unintentionally with our mower I might have wanted to cut down the plants before the frost and dry the leaves and pickle the pods. The dried leaves can be used to thicken soups or for tea. We could save seed for planting next year. Maybe I can interest someone else in doing that. Maybe having fewer plants left to deal with will be seen as an advantage for that task!