Broccoli Rabe and Arugula

Broccoli Rabe

Pronunciation: [RAHB]

A vegetable related to both the cabbage and turnip family, the leafy green broccoli rabe has 6- to 9-inch stalks and scattered clusters of tiny broccoli like buds.

I had to look that up because there is a story behind this broccoli. The dark colored leaves in the picture above is called broccoli rabe. The lighter colored leaves are aragula plants, very tasty and good for stir fry recipes. Anyway, my husband bought a packet of seedling material from the gardening section at SM mall here in Baguio City. This one packet contained several different kinds of vegetables and were wrapped in their own individual foil pouch. One of the pouch is that of the broccoli and the other is aragula and we planted these side by side in one of the garden beds. They both grew well and when it was time to gather, the aragula plants were harvested first and we left the broccoli behind. We thought that the broccoli needed more time to form into a ball-like cluster, just like the ones that we normally buy in the market.

Then one day, my sister-in-law Emy asked me why we were not gathering the broccoli plants. She said that the vegetables have been ready for harvest a week ago, in which I replied that no, they're not matured enough yet. My husband and I were waiting for the plants to form into a ball-like cluster and since they're not in that stage yet, so they're still young. So then she explained to us that what we had planted was a different kind of broccoli. In fact, they used to grow these in her hometown in Kapangan Benguet and they were sold at a higher price than the regular broccoli that we know of. Ha-ha, that was really something new to us. So anyway, we both gathered the broccoli and divided the produce between us. I cooked my share in a stir fry recipe and it tasted good but I found it a little tough. Had we known that this kind will not form into a ball-like cluster, we would have gathered them earlier while they were younger and they would have been more tender. It's a lesson learned in gardening with vegetables for newbies like us.