Creasy Greens/Upland Cress

[chrysanthemum]

I asked a question in a different thread about whether anyone was familiar with Creasy Greens, and I thought maybe it would be better to start a thread of its own.

I grew up in Virginia where Creasy Greens are popular, but my folks didn’t grow them, and I wasn’t familiar with them until I became an adult.  A friend of my mother’s grows a huge patch of them in his garden, though he refers to them as “Cree salad,” and he gives bunches of them to my mother.  I’ve had the opportunity to eat them as a a cooked green at her house, and I loved them.  My older kids enjoyed them as well; I’m not sure that the youngest has had the chance to try them yet.

I’ve never grown these, but they are always something in the back of my mind to try.  Once I was given seeds of “Upland Cress” from an old seed packet, and I started them inside in my Aerogarden system.  I never got any germination.  I don’t know if it was the conditions or just simply old seed.

I’ve still got time to start some fall greens down here (the temperature has cooled some, but it’s definitely still summer for a while), and so I’ve been thinking about these again.  I wanted to see if anyone on here has experience with them.

@rdback, these are popular in your area.  Have you grown them?

Here’s a link to an article about them.

katesgardenkitchen.com/2021/03/02/creasy-greens/

Here’s a video from a YouTube gardener to whom hmoosek introduced me.  It seems that these will grow in Texas.

[hmoosek]

I’m going to have to try them now! I really like his channel and I’ve learned a lot from him. Off to look for seeds.

[chrysanthemum]

I found another video that I thought you might like, hmoosek. It’s not so much about gardening as about harvesting, cleaning, and cooking the greens. It’s not a polished video and kind of long but still worth watching if you have the time. The presenter does make an interesting point, though, about not crowding the greens to get more leaves on the stems. I know that my mother’s friend grows them in big rosettes. She told me that he uses them as a winter cover crop for his garden.

[hmoosek]

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[woodeye]

I suppose I could plant cress in the grow bag that the Woods Mountain Crazy Beans once grew in but are no longer with us. Maybe the grasshoppers wouldn't like the peppery flavor of cress...

[heavyhitterokra]

Oh, Wow! Those things grow wild around here in abundance! They grow a tall, yellow flower along an elongated stem in the Spring.  I've never heard them named before, but I've seen them growing all along the river and the creeks around here and have often wondered if they were edible. I've nibbled the leaves, they taste sort of like a mild radish or nasturtium, but I've never been brave enough to eat them in any large volume. I'll have to try some next Spring when they're fresh, they are probably kind of hot this time of year. Thanks, for posting that Chrysanthemum.  I learned something new again today.

[macmex]

Me too! They look like they'd be good to eat but I've never pursued the idea. I know that rabbits LOVE them.

[chrysanthemum]

Wow, heavyhitterokra and macmex , I wasn’t expecting anyone except possibly @rdback to have it growing wild, just because I think of it as being an Appalachian thing. That’s awesome that you both have it. I wonder if there are any seeds to be found this time of year, or if they’ve all fallen already.

My mother’s friend who grows the “Cree salad” in his garden in the wintertime raises rabbits. I wonder if he does it in part to feed them.

I’m on a quest to find a green that I can grow easily and that my whole family enjoys. I’m finding it tricky. We just had turnip greens for lunch. I loved them. Just the smell of them cooking got me so hungry, and I didnt’ even do anything fancy. I just love the greens themselves, but there were mixed reviews from the family. I think I’m going to make a chart on paper and take a picture just so you all can see our widely divergent green preferences.

I made the chart.  The checks means that person like the greens.  The X’s mean a dislike.  The dashes are something in between, kind of like, “I’ll eat it, but it’s not really my preference.”  My kids are pretty good about eating what they’re served, but I really prefer to serve them food that they really enjoy.  I don’t want to force them to eat vegetables that they don’t like.  

What I find weird is that my one child who doesn’t enjoy beet greens too much—used to hate them, now is more neutral—loved the turnip greens today, whereas as the other children either didn’t like them or were more neutral.  They’d much rather have beets.  It’s amazing how tastes vary.




I have some mustard greens in the freezer that I have yet to try.  We’ve had collards, but I don’t remember everybody’s specific reaction, but I know it wasn’t so enthusiastic for some.  Things like cabbage and Napa go over fairly well, especially in fermented forms like sauerkraut and kimchi.  

I think the lesson of my chart is that I ought to see if I can manage to get a good kale crop this winter.  A big problem for me is that because it’s often so warm, the butterflies and moths fly most of the fall and winter months, and sometimes I just can’t keep up with the cabbage worms.

[chrysanthemum]

Aug 26, 2022 21:14:35 GMT -6 hmoosek said:

40% off

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Thanks, hmoosek.

I’ve got to get my brain organized about what I really need.  I try to combine seed orders as much as possible, but boy, this is tempting, especially because Kitazawa Seed Company sells a hybrid slicing cucumber that has done super well for me (Southern Delight).  I was hoping that Jibai Shimoshirazu would be a good OP replacement, and it may be.  This year it just didn’t have a chance to shine because of the weather.  I don’t know if Southern Delight would have done better, but it has been great for me every summer so far, and I was missing it this year.

[heavyhitterokra]

The crease greens grow down by the creek. This time of year, seed ticks and yearlings are so bad that no one in their right mind strays off the beaten path. It will be after frost before I go walking down there again. 

[Deleted]

Very interesting, Heavyhitterokra. I bought seed for them this spring but haven't grown them yet. I suppose I might give these a try and plant them this fall then. I though I could only plant them in the spring.

[heavyhitterokra]

Midwesterner, I didn't mean to imply that Creasy Greens are actively growing this time of year.  I have no idea if they are or not?

Like I mentioned above, "No one in their right mind strays off the beaten path this time of year." Ticks out here are atrocious in the months of May, June, July, August, and September.  Tick-borne diseases in this region abound.

I had a severe case of Lyme Disease once that put me in the hospital.  I was down with a fever that lasted a little over a month, from Memorial Day that year until around July 4th. I've never been so sick with anything in my life. After that experience, ticks give me flu-like symptoms repeatedly and make me feel sick every summer. I avoid them like the plague.  Even so, hardly a day goes by that I don't catch a few of them in the months of July and August when seed ticks and yearlings are hatching everywhere . When you live in the country there is no way to avoid them unless you really just do not venture outside at all. Ticks are literally everywhere here.  It's not uncommon to brush up against a patch of seed ticks so thick that it looks like a patch of dust the size of a softball is migrating across your pant leg.

For that reason, I don't know if the Creasy Greens are even still alive this time of year.  I just know where they grow in early Spring.

[chrysanthemum]

Ugh, Heavyhitterokra. Those ticks sound awful. My mother is plagued with them as well, though I don’t think she’s ever contracted a tick-borne illness thankfully. Lyme disease is an awful illness.

I will admit that I haven’t been as tick aware since moving down here to Texas. I don’t know if it’s the climate or just the fact that our property was so barren when we moved in, but I haven’t actually seen a tick in nearly five years. My husband and I were just noticing yesterday that formerly bare spots of our property are greening up after the rain, and we try to let just about everything grow (unless we know it’s an invasive plant) to restore the land. We’ll probably need to be more on the lookout for ticks (and snakes).

I’ve been doing a little more reading about upland cress (creasy greens) and found a note on the Pinetree Garden Seeds website that said that seeds don’t germinate well in soil temperatures above 70 degrees. I wanted to mention that because, if true, it means that those of us who want to try it this fall will probably need to wait a while longer.

www.superseeds.com/products/cress-upland-25-days

[rdback]

Aug 27, 2022 13:09:23 GMT -6 chrysanthemum said:

...I wasn’t expecting anyone except possibly @rdback to have it growing wild...

I don't have any firsthand experience with creasy greens, but it could be growing out there somewhere, lol. I'll keep an eye out for it. I do, however, have way too much experience with ticks!

[hmoosek]

rdback heavyhitterokra

The woods behind my house are full of those little seed ticks. That’s why I don’t venture out there too often. Some years are worse than others. I’ve been wanting to get my alcohol stoves out and have some fun. Of course I could do it on the front porch, but that’s not much of an adventure.