In preparing vegetables care should be given to cleanse them by washing
them in cold salted water, but they should not be made sodden by long
immersion. Fresh vegetables should be cooked the day of gathering,
and one cannot be too careful about all tinned vegetables, especially
tomatoes, mushrooms, and lentils. All green vegetables should be
removed from the water as soon as cooked, and well drained. To avoid
any offensive smell caused by cabbage or other greens, put a piece of
bread or toast with them while cooking; this will absorb the odour. All
vegetables should be served very hot.
GLOBE ARTICHOKE (_Cynara Scolymus. Compositæ_).
This is a perennial plant, but is apt to deteriorate under cultivation;
therefore, if possible, a third of the plantation should be renewed
yearly. It does not always stand our cold and damp winters, though it
may be considered hardy in the south of England.
The Globe Artichoke does not always come true to seed, so that it is
better to renew or start a plantation by means of rooted suckers, which
the plant freely throws off. If seed be selected it should be sown in a
mild hotbed in March and planted in its permanent bed in May.
A light, rich loam is preferred, heavy soils holding too much damp
for this somewhat delicate plant, which requires perfect drainage yet
plenty of water during the growing season. A sunny position should be
chosen for the bed, the ground should be trenched and well manured, and
the plants be put out in April about three feet apart according to the
variety.
Keep the soil stirred with the hoe, and give plenty of water during
drought, with occasional doses of weak liquid manure. In giving manure
water to this, as to all other subjects, it should be extremely dilute,
and should be applied during showery weather, or, if in dry weather,
should be preceded and followed by copious watering with plain water.
In the autumn the plants must be trimmed up, and winter protection
given in the shape of straw or fern covering.
The crop comes in over a longish period, beginning in late June with
the older plants and going on into the Autumn with the plants put out
in the spring. The flowering heads should be gathered when they are
about three-parts grown, and well before they open.
JERUSALEM ARTICHOKE (_Helianthus tuberosus. Compositæ_).
This perennial sunflower gives, perhaps, the heaviest yield per square
yard of any garden crop. It is of the easiest culture, and may be grown
in the same plot of ground year after year, an advantage in its case,
as once in the ground it is very difficult to get rid of it. The ground
should be prepared in late winter by trenching in a moderate quantity
of manure. The tubers may be planted any open day in February or March
in rows three feet apart, the sets eighteen inches in the rows. The
rest of the culture simply consists in hoeing up weeds; the crop may be
left in the ground and dug as required from September onwards, but it
should be all cleared up before the tubers start to grow in March.
CHINESE ARTICHOKE (_Stachys tuberifera_).
These require exactly similar treatment to Jerusalem Artichokes, except
that the plants need be only a foot to fifteen inches apart. They
withstand frost well, and may stay in the ground and be dug as wanted.