How to Grow Lebanese Watercress

by glenop (subscribe)

Like a caterpillar to a cabbage, I'm attracted to vegetables that are easy to grow and easy to maintain, grow like a weed, have very few if any pests and best of all; I actually like to eat them.

When I was browsing at Bunning's a year or so ago, I may have stumbled upon what I think is the best tasting, easiest to grow salad green of them all. Lebanese Watercress (also known as Fools Cress) is a perennial that you never have to re-sow or replant. In fact you are more likely to have to thin it out. You don't need to feed it and after a year of growing it, I know of no pests of any description that are interested in it. It is fast growing and can take full sun or part shade.

And best of all, you rarely have to water it. Well, apart from the first time. Lebanese watercress is an aquatic plant. I have mine growing in an old aquarium. It stands in a pot with some sandy soil on the bottom. It soon took over and I will need to thin it out soon as I can't eat enough of it.



Lebanese Watercress has a light green fern like leaf and tastes somewhat, something, somewhere between a carrot and celery. It has none of the sharp peppery taste that regular watercress has. Throw it in a salad, sandwich or an interesting pesto.

Does this all sound too good to be true? No, it's all true. Why can't you buy it at Colesworths? Dunno.

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