All About Growing Swiss Chard

By Barbara Pleasant
Published on February 19, 2009
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You can substitute cooked chard greens for spinach in any recipe, and steam or grill the crisp ribs of the plant just as you would asparagus.
You can substitute cooked chard greens for spinach in any recipe, and steam or grill the crisp ribs of the plant just as you would asparagus.
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Among the benefits of growing Swiss chard: it's an excellent source of several minerals and vitamins A, C, and K, making it a valuable food for maintaining strong bones.
Among the benefits of growing Swiss chard: it's an excellent source of several minerals and vitamins A, C, and K, making it a valuable food for maintaining strong bones.

(For details on growing many other vegetables and fruits, visit our Crop at a Glancecollection page.)

Gardeners have been growing Swiss chard since the time of Aristotle, a testament to its enduring appeal; food plants have a way of making friends when they’re colorful, nutritious, delicious, and hardy. Chard is sort of a forerunner to beets and a close cousin to spinach, close enough that in many instances it can be substituted for the latter. We’ve compiled a few suggestions here for its cultivation and storage.

Types to Try

White-stemmed varieties consistently outperform their more colorful counterparts in terms of productivity and bolt resistance.

Brightly colored varieties are the queens of edible ornamentals. Varieties bearing red, pink, yellow, or orange ribs are available individually or in pre-packaged mixtures.

Perpetual varieties, which are often called perpetual spinach, have thinner stems and smaller, smoother leaves than larger varieties, and they taste more like spinach. The short, stocky plants work well in small gardens and containers.

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