13 edible crops that won't die in a Perth summer
Veggies, fruits & herbs that will *actually* thrive in our blistering heat
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Most edible plants are thirsty, hungry beasts. Which presents a bit of a problem if you live in a place like Perth, where the soils are barren and (in summer at least) dry, sandy and generally devoid of the things that typically sustain plant life.
It makes veggie gardening a little…challenging, to say the least. And I’ve discovered that the internet is absolutely NO help when it comes to recommendations for drought-tolerant edible crops. A cursory glance at the plant recommendations for dry gardens tells me one thing: people who don’t live in Perth do not understand the meaning of *dry*. Tomatoes, zucchinis, eggplants - these are not drought loving veggies! Sure, they can handle the heat better than, say, a lettuce, but you’re not going to get the best crop of your life if you don’t throw these guys a little bit of water.
The plants on today’s list are the truly tough bastards. They were born in the desert, they cut their teeth on hot, sandy soils, and they are the best crops to plant if you want a garden resilient enough to withstand whatever this coming summer throws at it. Also, they taste great.
Artichokes
The fact that there are people in Perth who a) haven’t tasted an artichoke and b) haven’t filled their gardens with these amazing plants is a total tragedy. Artichokes are AMAZING. Their silver foliage looks beautiful and structural towards the back of a garden bed, and the bees LOVE their pollen-covered purple flowers. They are such tough, ornamental plants, and the flower buds they produce and an exceptional ingredient for a whole heap of Mediterranean dishes (for starters you can them and dunk the leaves in this vinaigrette)!
If you decide not to eat them (a horrific mistake to make, but each to their own), these buds will open into the most incredible, pollen rich flowers with royal purple centres. What’s more, being perennials, artichokes will come back year after year. There is NOTHING not to love about artichokes. Grow some!!!
Fennel
In Perth, Fennel is so hardy that it grows wild in vacant housing lots. It self seeds through our garden every year - I never plant it anymore! It is an incredible cooking ingredient (all parts of the plant are edible!). My advice is to harvest some bulbs to cook with, and leave a few plants to flower in springtime; the flowers taste like liquorice and the bees love them! Once the flowers fade, harvest the seeds to resow or to cook with over the year (they taste fantastic thrown into pasta sauces and curries).
Kale
Nurse kale through its seedling phase and it will become surprisingly drought-tolerant - the thick leaves make it less needy or delicate than lettuce. Kale is a funny one because I think a lot of people WANT to like eating it (it’s a superfood, it’ll make you immortal etc etc), but these same tough, thick leaves are it’s downfall. They can make it leathery and tough to chew.
Fortunately there’s an easy workaround - to make the best kale salad, chop away the stem, tear the leaves up, sprinkle them with salt and olive oil and then give them a little massage. Yes, a massage.
Rub the oil and salt into the leaves and you’ll notice they instantly turn a brighter shade of green and soften. Add a sprinkle of good balsamic vinegar or a squeeze of lemon juice (maybe some cracked pepper and fresh garlic, maybe some shaved Parmesan and chilli flakes) and you have a bowl of kale that tastes the way it was always meant to.
Rocket
Peppery, delicious rocket, perfect atop a pizza or a pasta puttanesca! It’s a super tough one for your garden, doesn’t mind dry spells and will produce gorgeous yellow flowers in spring then self-seed through your garden for the next season!
Parsley
Sow seeds in autumn or early spring. Once established, parsley is reliably hardy through a hot, dry summer. Cook generously with parsley; throw large handfuls into soups, stocks and pasta sauces. Coarsely chop it and serve in a salad with cooked barley, cherry tomatoes and goats cheese feta. Stick a bunch of it on a sunny windowsill and call it a bouquet.
Lemongrass
Lemongrass can be almost entirely neglected and will still grow giant, so make sure to pop it in a pot unless you want it to explode in your garden. Or let it explode in your garden because it is beautiful and its stalks, finely chopped, will give you the best curries of your life. Also good in teas!
Sage
I kill sage all the time and I’m starting to think it’s because, despite my best efforts to neglect it, I’m still somehow giving it too much water.
Fresh sage is the best cooking ingredient - I love to cook it, I aspire to grow it, but this is a newsletter built on honest garden advice and, when it comes to sage - currently -I’m useless. This summer I plan to plant some more and entirely neglect it and I will report back.
In the meantime, if you are growing sage successfully, please pop your tips in the comments for me! If you have fresh sage in your garden, pair it with garlic, pumpkin, feta and walnuts - these ingredients were meant to be together.
Saltbush
Old man saltbush is rough and tough and well worth a spot in your garden. A totally under appreciated edible native, the leaves are silver and (as the name suggests) salty! A great one to sprinkle through salads and the silver foliage jumps out at you from the garden bed. Stick it nearby your silvery artichokes (perhaps with some purple mustard greens in between, to make the different foliage colours really pop!).
Jerusalem artichokes
Sunflower’s lazy, delicious cousin! Jerusalem artichokes are another one that everyone in Perth NEEDS to be growing! They produce a profusion of yellow, daisy-like flowers atop tall stems in late summer, and, once the flowers are finished, can be dug up and enjoyed for their sweet, edible roots.
Holy basil
Unlike sweet basil (which is the one I see most commonly grown in veggie patches), holy basil can handle some dry spells. If you let your sweet basil dry out it will not be sweet, it’ll get bitter and pretty average-tasting. For regular sweet basil, more water is better. For Holy Basil, which is native to the Middle East, a bit of drought is entirely tolerable. Holy basil is a fabulous ingredient if you like Moroccan dishes, and it’s a great one for your beds that tend to dry out a bit more once summer arrives.
Dragon fruit
I can’t speak from experience where dragon fruit are confirmed, as I chucked my one dragonfruit plant in a totally neglected bed, never watered it and allowed it to grow in near-total shade. So obviously it never fruited. But that’s on me. And, most importantly - it didn’t die!!
Dragonfruit plants are tough and heat-loving and grow like floppy tall cacti. They are grown commercially on T-shaped frames, and will start to bear fruit once they are tall enough that their upper branches (growing along the top, horizontal part of the T frame) are allowed to dangle down. Writing this now, I realise I have totally dropped the ball on dragonfruit. I think I’ll give them another go this summer. You should too!
Society garlic
If you’re not already growing society garlic in your own garden, you have almost certainly seen it growing around the place. Society garlic is so tough it is used in lots of public plantings and median strips. It looks similar to chives and produces little Purple flowers that have a delicious garlicky pop. A truly tough little plant that is useful in so many dishes (the leaves are edible too and can be used in the same way you’d use chives or spring onions).
Caper bush
Capers! Did you know you can grow your own capers? Caper berry bushes are used to growing in hot rock crevices and can withstand a fair bit of heat and drought. Their flowers are truly beautiful (as ornamental and decorative as passionfruit flowers). If you’d like to make your own capers, harvest the buds before the flowers open, and pop them in a salty brine. If you’d like to make caper berries, wait for the big, grape-sized berries that form once the flowers have finished. Caper bushes are a sort of trailing plant, so they work well cascading down over a raised bed or out of a large pot.
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Definitely keen to try capers! I’d never seen the plant before visiting Greece last year, where the leaves are pickled and served in (what we call ‘Greek’) salad! It was growing in every rocky crevice on Santorini 🇬🇷
Another great list!!