Cauliflower Clapton F1

The 'Clapton F1' Cauliflower (in Latin, Brassica oleracea botrytis) is a beautiful variety with good taste quality, specially selected for its resistance to clubroot. The sowing of this Cauliflower is to be spread from April to June for a harvest from August to November.

With a pure white colour and even, in recent years, joyfully yellow, orange or purple, the Cauliflower is a flowering vegetable whose fleshy meristem is consumed. It belongs to the large family of Brassicaceae (formerly Cruciferae) and bears the Latin name Brassica oleracea botrytis. Sometimes called Cyprus Cabbage, the Cauliflower is a biennial vegetable plant originally from China.

Consumed for the first time in Germany only 300 years ago, this vegetable has earned a place of honour in our kitchens because it lends itself to many preparations. It can be consumed raw in salads or cooked, plain, in a gratin with béchamel sauce or accompanied by a curry sauce that complements its flavour very well. It is a low-calorie vegetable and rich in vitamin C.

There are many varieties of Cauliflowers, each with a distinct growing period that must be respected. You can have this vegetable all year round by carefully choosing your seeds.

Cauliflower is a demanding vegetable requiring excellent basal fertilisation and regular moisture.

NB: This variety is labelled F1 for "F1 hybrid" because it results from the cross-breeding of carefully selected parents to combine their qualities. This results in a variety that can be exceptionally flavorful and early while resistant to certain diseases. Sometimes criticised or wrongly associated with GMOs, F1 hybrid seeds are attractive for their uniformity and resistance. Still, unfortunately, their qualities do not pass on to subsequent generations: it will, therefore, not be possible to recover the seeds for later sowing.

Harvest: The Cauliflower is harvested when its head is compacted by cutting it at ground level.

Storage: Cauliflower does not keep very well. It is best to consume it quickly after harvesting. It can be kept for a few days in the refrigerator. You can also freeze it after blanching it for 3 minutes in salted boiling water.

The gardener's tip: The main enemy of cabbage, the Cabbage White Butterfly (Pieris brassicae) is a pretty cream-white butterfly with small black spots that awakens from April-May to wreak havoc all summer by devouring its leaves. While spraying a solution based on Bacillus Thuringiensis is an acceptable curative measure, we prefer, at our place, to opt for prevention by installing an insect-proof net tightly on market garden hoops. These nets are easy to set up and reusable to protect, for example, your carrot and leek crops.