Lettuce Eluarde - Lactuca sativa

The Oak Leaf Lettuce Eluarde is a compact variety with shiny leaves that are heavily tinted with intense red, flexible, and beautifully cut. Its well-filled heart is dense and healthy. It is an easy salad to grow in the vegetable garden. It can be harvested in spring and autumn.

If Lettuce is one of the most popular vegetables (consumed at a rate of 4.2 kilograms per person per year), it is as much for its freshness, crunchiness, as for its taste and nutritional qualities. It can be consumed raw in salads but also cooked, for example, to accompany peas.

As the ultimate leafy vegetable, Lettuce is an annual plant that belongs to the large Asteraceae family. Its Latin name, Lactuca sativa, refers both to the white sap (lactuca) that flows when it is cut and to the fact that it is cultivated (sativa).

It is an essential vegetable in any respectable vegetable garden, and there are so many varieties that it can be grown almost all year round.

Growing Lettuce is easy as long as the sowing calendar for each variety is respected. Its growth is rapid, and it thrives in any soil, as long as it is rich and remains moist.

Harvest: It is simply done with a knife when it reaches ripeness.

Storage: Lettuce can be stored for a few days in the refrigerator, but to enjoy its freshness to the fullest, we recommend consuming it immediately after harvesting.

Gardener's tip: During intense summer heat, lettuces exposed to full sun tend to wither miserably. To prevent this phenomenon, consider protecting them from excessive rays using overturned crates. In our garden, summer lettuces are not grown in rows but are interspersed throughout: at the base of climbing beans, in the middle of cucumbers and squash, whose foliage provides beneficial shade.

Note: Please note that our plug plants are professional products reserved for experienced gardeners: upon receipt, transplant and store them in sheltered areas (veranda, greenhouse, cold frame...) at a temperature above 14°C (57.2°F) for a few weeks before being installed outdoors once the risk of frost is permanently eliminated.