Bull’s Blood leaves are a bold deep burgundy colour with a sweet flavour: it a stunning addition to your salads. This is a fabulous baby leaf variety, the leaves are the reason for growing it rather than the root! You can take your first picking after about 5 weeks from sowing, and if you keep them moist they will resprout for a second salad cut. Picking the leaves takes energy away from the root growth so that these are much slower to form and often will stay insignificant as you harvest the leaves. Any roots are dark red, well flavoured and can have an attractive striped interior; pull after 6 weeks or so lovely mini beets but they are very slow to put on any more bulk than this (for the best beetroot roots take a look at the main beetroot section)
SOW: under glass in Jan/Feb for crops from May, sow in the open from mid-March to August. Make several sowings for a continuous supply. August sowings may need protection later.
GROW: this variety is grown just for the deep coloured and flavoursome leaves – treat as a cut-and-come-again salad crop ready in 5 weeks. You can get 4 or more cuts from one sowing. Keep weed free and try not to let the soil dry out.
EAT & ENJOY: the leaves are particularly good in salads, adding colour and flavour. They can also be sautéed or lightly stir fried.
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