Warrigal greens (or NZ spinach) : amazing leafy green spinach substitute!

This year our warrigal greens have gone berzerk. Taken over the kitchen salad garden so much we've cut heaps for the local cafe. We had to cut it back off the paths just to get the gas bottle in. Hardly use any water. No maintenance, hassle free greens. Rampant food - who could ask for more.

What is it? It's an Australian native plant found naturally near the coast. The New Zealanders have grown it and changed the name for marketing purposes (Bastards!). Its grown more in France than in Australia where its called Tetragon (from its Latin genus name Tetragonia). Its not a true spinach and grows as a sprawling, running bush.

I've eaten it raw in small quantities at the cafe in salads. I pick out the tips for them - only early in the season - it gets a bit tangy later in the season. Its best cooked due to the high oxalic acid content (like silverbeet leaves) later in the season. We don't like the stalks much.

Try it.

New Zealand spinach is the only name I've heard it called by here (Canada), although warrigal greens is a MUCH cooler name.

I get poor results with traditional spinach (bolts too fast) so this sounds promising. Every year, I try to plant something I've never tried before - maybe this year this it will be warrigal greens :)

Good luck with it (its pretty easy to grow though so you won't need luck).

I've had a similar experience with spinach bolting here but I still get some sort of crop. For many years this was my black-thumb crop until I found out there's prickly seeded varieties (the ones I was growing) and round seeded ones. It seems they are grown at different times.

Still researching these - keep you posted.
I haven't perfected the technique yet but we growers are a pretty persistant lot :)

Sounds like useful stuff, though perhaps a bit too rampant for my small garden. Right now, I'm going through Joy Larkcom's Oriental Vegetables, trying to decide what I can try in my three new raised beds, which are lightly shaded for half the day.

4 > I grew a baby bok choy last year that was very tasty and would probably do even better in a slightly more shaded area. I'm going to try it in a different part of the garden this year where it will get more shade. I can't recall the exact variety, though, and I'm not at home so can't look it up.

The pak choy I grew got too big (and I planted way too much LOL) - we couldn't eat it fast enough even with staggered planting, so although it was very nice I will not grow it again.

Thanks for that info, tardis. Bok choy is on my list for definite. I might try pak choy too, but perhaps just a few ;)