Organic Calabrese ‘Green Sprouting’

£2.20

Availability: 13 in stock

Soil Association Organic Logo          Brassica Oleracea – 0.33g – Approx 100 Seeds        

Our Calabrese ‘Green Sprouting’ is a traditional, open pollinated variety with a really good flavour.

It has lots of smaller heads and side shoots that are produced over a longer cropping period than a hybrid type which tends to have one large central head.

Sow your calabrese seeds under cover in trays or modules in the spring and pot on when the seedlings show their first true leaves. Harden off before planting out leaving around 45cm between plants. Alternatively the seeds can be direct sown around April to June. Harvest during the summer. The plant will continue to produce lots of side shoots after the main head is harvested.

Seed Story

Calabrese is a type of broccoli that originated from the wild cabbage. The Italian name for broccoli is “broccolo” which means the flowering top of cabbage.

Wild cabbage is a polymorphic plant which means that it can evolve into different forms. The wild cabbage produced kohl rabi, kale, brussels sprouts, broccoli and cauliflower.

Broccoli was an Italian favourite. Calabrese is named after Calabria in Italy and during the  17th century it was also known as Italian Asparagus. It made its way to Northern Europe and Britain by the 18th century before Italian immigrants introduced it to the US in the 1800s.