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When I was growing up, one of my favourite meals was gammon with parsley sauce. So when I started my own kitchen garden, I was determined to grow plenty of parsley. But even if you only have a few containers on the patio, it’s easy to grow plenty of parsley that’s much fresher and cheaper than the herbs on sale at the grocery store.
There are two main types of parsley. Curly parsley is very pretty, and looks great both when it’s growing (try using it as an edging plant) and as a garnish on the plate. The other type, flat-leaved parsley, it thought to have a better flavor and is therefore the choice of chefs and keen cooks.
Both types are grown in the same way. A spring sowing will give you fresh parsley all summer. The seeds can be slow to germinate outdoors, but if you start them in pots undercover it’s usually faster, and the seedlings don’t mind being transplanted. Keep them well watered until they are established.
Parsley grows well in containers, and can tolerate some shade. It likes a more plentiful supply of water than some other herbs, and you’ll get better crops if the plants aren’t thirsty. A container grown plant will need feeding to keep growing fresh leaves.
Slugs will attack young seedlings, but once the plants have reached a reasonable size they’re pretty much trouble-free. A second sowing in late summer will give you fresh leaves through mild winters (or indoors) and crops in spring before the spring-sown plants mature.
Parsley is a biennial, so it will flower in its second season. If you have the space, try leaving a flowering plant in place – it will attract beneficial insects into the garden, and you can try saving your own parsley seeds for next year.
Two more unusual plants that you might want to consider growing are Hamburg parsley and Par-Cel. Hamburg parsley is a root crop, commonly grown in Europe, with a parsley flavor. Par-Cel is an herb that looks like parsley, but tastes like celery. Both can be grown from seed, so keep an eye out for them in your seed catalogs.
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Author Bio Box: Emma Cooper
Emma Cooper is the author of Growing Vegetables is Fun. She also has a weekly gardening podcast, The Alternative Kitchen Garden, all about growing your own food in an environmentally friendly way. Check out her website for her gardening blog and more articles.
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