‘Beetroot is dead easy to grow and incredibly good for you. Forget about the stuff you buy in tins. Fresh beetroot from the garden is far superior in flavour and jam-packed with health-giving properties. There’s more to beetroot than the common round red varieties too. When you grow them yourself, you get to discover all sorts of different shapes and colours, including elongated tubers, and yellow and white flesh. And it’s not only the tubers – you can eat beetroot leaves as well and they’re great in salads. Beetroot are easy to grow from seed and you don’t need much space. So, find a sunny spot and get sowing!’ SBS “How to Grow”
PLANT Beetroot Spring and Autumn and even Winter in frost protected gardens. Soil should be friable and well composted with some organic fertilizer plus a little lime. Sow your seeds 2cm deep around 5cm apart in long rows for convenience but definitely be creative. Plant direct only because root vegetables don’t enjoy being transplanted. Sow every 2 weeks for a continuous harvest, your beets can be harvested in 45 days for the baby size and longer to allow swelling and a bigger size. Also, in moderation you can harvest some of the delicate leaves. Not too much or it will affect the bulb size. As usual, mulch well to protect from the heat and cold.
NUTRITION. Beets are high in the nutrients that provide antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and detoxification support. This is especially so when eaten raw such as juices and salads. Light steaming will very moderately reduce its nutrient still making the beetroot still very high in value. There’s lot of information of the disease fighting value in the bulb and the leaf and worthy of research.
