A box of mini turnips

Make the most of your space bygrow/ng mini turnips you can eat the tops and the roots of these tasty vegetables.
Time to sow: spring-late summer

Forget Baldrlck's tasteless old turnips these baby roots are fast growing and full of flavour. Tender, young baby turnips are a revelation to anyone used to tired, old roots cut into chunks in a stew. The seeds germinate within days, which makes this a great crop for the first-time veg grower. They grow lncredibly fast, too the first sowings are often ready to harvest in around 6 weeks. Turnips grow well in large containers, pots or even old fruit boxes filled with soil or a soil-based compost, as long as they’re thinned to about 8-10cm (3-4in) apart. if they grow too close together they will bolt and produce no roots. As they’re closely related to cabbages, the new young leaves can be harvested as a tasty leaf vegetable in early-mid-springl, when other crops are still getting under way. Good varieties include ’Purple Top Milan’, which has tasty flat-bottomed roots; ’Snowball’, which is perfectly white with a delicate flavour.

TIP It is essential to keep them well-watered to get them to produce a good crop, as turnips grow so rapidly.

references: BBC 2011 gardeners book
image: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-j0-4DTi1Lns/VnLDq3xGvJI/AAAAAAAABTg/dzkCRuYocu4/s1600/Scarlet%2BTurnips%2B02.jpg