Grow Chard for Year-Round Steamed Greens

Reader Contribution by Melodie Metje

Chard is a wonderful green, chock full of vitamins. It can be eaten when small in salads. The large leaves can be harvested for steamed/cooked greens. The stems can be steamed or braised as a substitute for celery. Chard has been around for centuries. It hails from Sicily and was known as sicula. No one is quite sure how it became known as Swiss Chard.

It is also ornamental if you pick one of the many beautiful colored ribs-shades of red, orange, pink, yellow. They grow tall when planted in the ground so make a great focus in the back of the garden bed.

It is a perennial in our Midwest garden. It grows in all seasons. Only the coldest weather kills it back to the ground, if not covered. It is one of the first things to sprout in the spring.

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