Bok choi is yummy, and very easy to grow!

Also adds spice to salads. Does well as a fall crop as it much less prone to bolting in the fall. Stands temps in the low 20's so it is good in the winter in the south. Mine just took 15 degrees and survived.

Looks great!

Amen!

I like the white stems raw and crunchy. Sweeter than carrots and juicy enough to quench my thirst. I think the stems are best like appetizers, cut into 2-3 inch lengths and as thick as a little finger. Then chill in water so they are as crisp and plump as possible. I think they lose a lot of sweetness and crispness within a few hours of picking.

If I let the stems get so old that the outer stems have strings, I eat them outside and enjoy spitting wads of strings like watermelon seeds, trying for distance.

Leaves that old go better in soup than in salad, or I suppose I could steam them as hearty greens. I've read that, in China, big old leaves are sun-dried and stored for winter soups.

If I still had a gas stove I would stir-fry the leaves, but an electric range isn't as good.

i think of them as a spinach substitute in salad, rather than a lettuce substitute.

I'm not a fan of cooked greens, so I prefer the young tender leaves. And I agree, Rick. Much more like spinach or cabbage than a substitute for lettuce. Although it also goes nicely with lettuce.

I do like "a mess o' greens" greens in ramen soup. But I agree with you: for salad, bok choy is much better young or very young.

The trendy, expensive thing is apparently "microgreens", which take the idea of baby leaves to an extreme. Depending on who you read, microgreens are just the seedling leaves (cotyledons), or one pair of real leaves, or at most two pair. That's just one step past seed sprouts!

http://www.johnnyseeds.com/t-m...

I used to over-cook bok choy stems in soup. They would get mushy and be undesirable. Now my policy is to get them barely heated all the way through, so they stay crisp. That's why I cut them into thin strips or pencils, so that a brief simmering is enough to get them hot.

Best of all is to eat the stems raw.

A bok choi recipe from Vegetarian Times:

http://www.vegetariantimes.com...

I liked the photo which showed big stems and leaves of Bok Choy almost like a garnish.
And this sounded good:
"For the best texture, choose larger bunches of bok choy, which will remain crisp-tender after cooking."

But reading lower, I saw:
" thinly sliced bok choy "
" sauté 8 minutes, or until vegetables turn golden "
" simmer 3 minutes "

Three minutes of simmering will turn whole leaves soft and mushy.
Eight minutes of sauteing in hot oil will make "thin slices" of stem turn to weak Jell-O!

Oh, well, I know very little about cooking.

I wonder if I still have time to start some up here. Our temps are on the cool side though lots of sun if you don't count the cloudy days.

"Cool" is best for Bok Choy.

Since baby leaves and young leaves are delicious, you could start them for salad as late as 3 weeks before frost (and most varieties do tolerate a little light frost).

Some varieties are fully mature by 35 days, and some big ones take 50 days to reach full size (5-7 weeks).
Most varieties quote 40-45 days to maturity (6 weeks), but that's not assuming 19 hours of sunlight!

I think you could still get a fully mature crop even if your first fall frost was as early as August 1 or 8.

They say that Chinese cabbage (like Napa and Michihli) likes shortening day length. Maybe it would like Alaska?