Lettuces and spinach

We have had immense good fortune with both lettuces and perpetual spinach in our 1st year. Andrew took the seed box back down to the shed last night, so I don't have the packets here to tell you the names - I'll get them soon.
Update: the lettuces are a mixture of many types - From one packet we have Leaf Salad (lettuce mixed) and the other is Red Salad Bowl.

The lettuces came as a mixture of three different ones, cut and come again, I think they were free with some magazine or other. My goodness the amount of money saved in growing you own is brilliant. I would buy about two bags of mixed lettuce in Tesco a week (£1.25 approx each), and these plants just keep on giving. We actually planted a couple too many, so last night a red lollo rosso? was just plucked straight up and brought home. It looks like a wedding bouquet...



This is our favourite variety, you'd often see Andrew walking around the allotment, supposedly working, but really eating leaves straight off the plants. The other varieties, I swear, look just like the ones from the Peter Rabbit books.

The perpetual spinach is my wee secret joy, I love spinach and when in Barcelona a few years ago, had a dish (many times) of chicken with steamed spinach, prunes, pine nuts and balsamic vinegar. So good and my first experience of the ingredient (were it wasn't boiled to bits). I don't eat much red meat so it's great for the iron levels too, good in sandwiches and lovely stir fried. Oh, I could sing it's praises. Don't forget, if you're harvesting some for a meal, cut loads, it wilts away to nothing whilst cooking. I've noticed some other people put up seasonal recipes on their sites, good to look at. (All the cookery programmes have websites now too).

This picture is a basket full of the stuff - Spinach (Leaf Beet) plus one carrot and the lettuce perched on the side.