SPRING EDITORIAL 2019

My parents recently returned from a holiday in Europe. My father was raving about these “new” lettuces he had been eating the entire time he was away – “Little Gem” cos. They were buying them in a three pack from the supermarkets and it would appear Dad was devouring them as a snack.

I had to break it to my father that in fact mini cos was nothing new and was being sold in New Zealand and had been for some time. He was shocked that he wasn’t aware but no doubt added them to their weekly shopping.

Keeping in mind that my father is very near 70 years old and a semi-retired South Island sheep and cattle farmer – not that I am making stereotypes but there isn’t too much need for a Little Gem cos in the Hakataramea Valley.

This has had me thinking. The 5+aday campaign which we are very proud to support and supply vegetable seed for their education resources does a great job along with United Fresh and many other organisations such as vegetables.co.nz to promote vegetable consumption to the New Zealand public. However, further from that is considering how we promote to vegetable consumers to try new vegetable types.

I myself am guilty of not fully exploring the vegetable offering. Recently whilst judging the Young Vegetable Grower of the Year one of our joint winners, Austin Singh, presented his marketing module on kohlrabi and had brought in some product for us to sample. Whilst we do sell kohlrabi I had in fact never tried it.

Getting back to the South Island sheep and beef reference - having been brought up in this environment I am a great fan of the swede and turnip straight from the paddock. Many a trip south to visit customers in Southland has seen me boarding the flight home with a couple of giant swedes as hand luggage. So I was rather surprised to discover that kohlrabi is in fact a little like swede in flavour and texture.

With three young boys, four and under, I am always looking for new ways to get more veggies into these mini people, and so now kohlrabi cut into dipping sticks along with some hummus feature for our snacks.

This then had me thinking what other vegetables we sell that I have never brought myself or cooked with. These include – fennel, celeriac, spaghetti squash and kumi kumi. So as I am now taking a period of parental leave at home with our newest addition (4 weeks old as I write this) I may in fact use the time to tick these other vegetables off the list and may be surprised to find some new favourites for the family.