CHINESE CONTAINER GARDENS - Growing Chinese Vegetables in Your Own Backyard - page 195

Chinese Broccoli, page 80
Brassica oleracea Alboglabra Group
This is a good choice for container gardeners who want to grow broccoli; it takes up
only half the space of common broccoli and is extremely prolific. It grows best outdoors
or in a greenhouse.
Sow the seeds ½ inch deep and 1 inch apart in a 5-gallon container. Thin young
plants to stand 6 inches apart, and eat the thinnings. For a single plant, use a 12-inch
pot. Keep plants evenly moist but not soggy. Feed when plants are six weeks old.
Pak Choy, page 83
Brassica rapa Chinensis Group
Pak choy is easy to grow and lends itself to container gardening, both indoors and out.
Since it's leafy rather than fruiting, it does well under lights, which means you can en-
joy it all winter.
Since it's a cool-weather vegetable, sow in early spring, or in midsummer for a fall
crop. Indoors, you can sow it any time. You can harvest it like leaf lettuce, taking just
the outside leaves until hot weather affects the growth. Or pick the whole spring crop,
use the space for some other vegetable, then replant pak choy for fall or winter use.
Quick-maturing vegetables like pak choy allow container gardeners to grow a greater
variety of good things to eat.
Sow seeds ½ inch deep and 6 inches apart. Plant closer together and eat thinnings
for an extra-early crop, or tuck a plant into a larger container with other vegetables such
as radishes, garlic chives, and mizuna.
Keep well watered and fertilize every two or three weeks. Harvest it as needed, any
time from five weeks on.