[hubballi]

Tonight we had our first meal of purple sprouting broccoli and were supprised at how nice the leaves were after cooking which begs the question does anyone else eat the leaves ? They were very like spinach. If so, how long can the leaves be harvested  before composting after the heads have been used.

[Salmo]

The leaves are the best bit. As you continue picking the new shoots will get smaller. When the weather really warms up the shoots will go to flower very quickly and the leaves will get too strong to eat.

[Paul Plots]

So I guess the answer might be not to wear your specs when you harvest the purple flowers - that way you could end up with a decent percentage of the leaves further down the flower stems..

Personally I love them - flowers, stalk and leaves..

[Digger Mum]

I'm a new convert to psb and yep, eat the leaves too! (after harvesting the broccoli there's very little of it to make a meal so I need the leaves  )

[Paul Plots]

After my recent worry that the pickings would be small..........
    Picked a big carrier-bag full today!!

I seem to remember thinking there'd be very little to pick last year too ...isn't patience a wonderful thing... Wish I had some

[Janeymiddlewife]

We had some more of ours tonight - yummy. But I have a question - I may well be confused - seem to remember readng somewhere about cutting off the lower leaves as well as the centre stalks to promote the  "heads" - is this right or am I more confused than what I thought 

[Paul Plots]

I'm a bit confused about that too.

I just nip out the flower and then wait for something magical to happen and another lot to appear...

[Greasehog]

I eat the leaves too.. They taste great....

[Stripey_cat]

I'm a bit confused about that too.

I just nip out the flower and then wait for something magical to happen and another lot to appear...

You get a big head in the centre of the plant.  If you pick that, the plant then makes lots of smaller flowering heads from the growth-points lower down the stem.  It's like pinching the top off a plant to make it bushier, only with flowers not leaves (in fact, it's exactly the same as taking out the main bud to grow spray chrysanths - presumably if you want really big calabrese heads for the summer show you want to debud the side-shoots like for an exhibition bloom).

[LivvyW]

We had PSB for dinner tonight too!  We eat the leaves. But the stems are my favorite bit.
Really sweet and tender.

My two and a half year old thinks she's eating whole trees!

[andreadon]

can you eat the leaves before the head sprouts?

also, is this rule just for psb, or does it work for normal broccoli too?