Growing mustard

[FarmerDenise]

Mustard grows wild in our area. If you look at pics of Sonoma or Napa county (California), you will often see fields with yellow wild flowers. It's mustard.
The seeds are black. The old Italians eat the flowering tops before they open, cooked like broccoli, many eat the leaves in salads or as cooked greens, and the bees love it. It also makes a good green cover crop in the vinyards. We had lots of it growing last year, so I thought I'd try and gather the seeds and see if I could make mustard using the seeds. I have used them in pickles before and it worked well. These seeds are also smaller than the yellow mustard seed you buy at the store. It took a lot of time to gather the mustard stems, separate the seed from the pods and end up with about 2 cups of seed.
I have gathered the dried stalks in the past, because the chickens and the rabbit love this as a treat in the spring and summer.
The mustard I made today sure smelled really good. I used the recipe from Nourishing Traditions.
It grow in the winter, our rainy and cold season. I would think you could grow mustard in the summer in New England.

There are different types of mustard. I am currently growing a green leafy mustard in my garden as well. I might let it go to seed also, just to see what kind of seed I get. If I were to purposely grow mustard seed, I would try it, using mustard seeds from the spice rack. The seeds I got from this wild mustard were very small.

 

[TanksHill]

 

[freemotion]

Thanks, FD! Now I realize that there was a lot of mustard growing wild in the farmer's fields in Maine when I lived there. I don't see it much here, not enough to collect any. But I did see 2-3 varieties at the greenhouse where I buy my started plants, being sold as a cooking green.

I think I will see if I can start some seeds from the ones I bought at Whole Foods and maybe naturalize them in my pasture.

 

[FarmerDenise]

Thought I'd post how I gather the seed too.
The mustard needs to be totaly dry and look like straw yellow. Then you can either gather the complete tops and get the seeds out later, or just go along with a unbreakable bowl in one hand and use the other to squeeze/crush the mustard pods. They split open and have a membrane in the middle. Seeds grow along both sides of the membrane, just strip those out. You'll have to winnow the seeds, because you will end up with lots of chaff.
I find sometimes it is easier to pick the top seedy part and then break open the pods at my leisure while sitting in comfort in the yard. I also found that by leaving the seeds and chaff sitting in the bowl for a while, that I could see little bugs crawling in there. I was then able to pick those out.

 

[TanksHill]

Thank you!!!!

 

[FarmerDenise]

pics of mustard in bloom

I took these a few years ago. We didn't have that much mustard this year

 

[justusnak]

That stuff grows CRAZY wild here.....I never thought of harvesting it. Hmmmmmmmmm....maybe I will get some this year..but then I will need help, in what to do with the seeds! LOL

 

[FarmerDenise]

I used them for pickling and to make my own mustard. It is really hot almost like horse radish