Baby leaf is literally the baby leaf. It is not a special variety, but prematurely harvested lettuce of existing types. Baby leaf requires particular ways of growing. On each square meter 800-1000 seeds are compactly sown by a machine. After a short growing period of several weeks, the leaf can be harvested at a length of 8-10 centimetres.
Baby leaf is most commonly used in salad packages. These contain five to eight different kinds of lettuce, such as lollo rosso, lollo bionda, batavia, cancan, red and green oak leaf, rucola and red chard. These lettuce types can also be bought individually as baby leaf, because they were all sown separately and mixed afterwards.
The characteristics of baby leaf are:
- young, tender and tasteful leaves;
- minimal cutting surface, therefore no cutting wounds;
- easy to process, as the product does not need cutting;
- no coarse veins;
- high variety mix due to colour and shapes.
Availability
Netherlands: February - December
Spain: November - May
Also grown by: