(Norsk forklaring nedenfor) Mauka (Mirabilis expansa) is a root vegetable grown, amongst others by the Maukallajta Indians in the Andes and I cultivated it for the first and only time outdoors in Malvik in 2012 with seed from Owen Smith … and it grew vigorously laterally (therefore the epithet expansa) and I even got a harvest! Unfortunately, I can’t remember tasting the roots and think that they simply rotted in store before I could try them. But, I did eat the leaves in a salad. Below you will find an album of pictures from my trial in 2012 (I later tried twice with seeds from Bergen Botanical Garden but did not get germination). In Bergen Botanical Garden, I saw a lush plant at Milde on October 22, 2014 (in the collection of vegetables from the Andes) and the next day I was surprised to find it in the rock garden at the Museumsplassen (pictures from Bergen are in a separate album below)! Norsk:Mauka (Mirabilis expansa) er en rotgrønnsak dyrket bl.a. av Maukallajta indianerne i Andesfjellene og jeg dyrket den for første og eneste gang på friland i Malvik i 2012…og den vokste utrolig mye sideveis (derfor epiteten expansa) og jeg fikk faktisk noe å høste (jeg hadde ingen tro etter dårlige erfaringer med andre planter fra Andesfjellene)! Jeg kan dessverre ikke huske at jeg smakte på røttene og tror at de rett og slett råtnet før jeg kunne prøve. Men, jeg spiste bladene i en salat. Nedenfor finner dere bilder fra mitt forsøk i 2012 (jeg prøvde senere to ganger med frø fra Bergen Botaniske Hage, men fikk ingen spiring). I Bergen har jeg sett en frodig plante på Milde 22. oktober 2014 (i samlingen av grønnsaker fra Andesfjellene) og neste dag var jeg overrasket å finne den i fjellhagen på Museumsplassen (bilder fra Bergen i en separat album nedenfor!
I first saw Mauka in the “flesh” on 10th October 2008 when I visited Frank van Keirbilck’s garden in Scheldewindeke, Belgium (I met Frank and mauka through the Homegrown Goodness forum). I call his garden “Andes in Flanders)! Here are a couple of pictures from Frank’s garden that day:
Pretty good germination, 21st March 2012 (germinated in my office at 23C within one week)
11th April
Growing well n the garden on 8h July
18th July: I noted that the leaves were slightly spicy and ” Today’s quick salad was made of lettuce (salat), perennial rucola (Diplotaxis), Minutina/Flikkjempe (Plantago coronopus), Salad Onions/Vårløk (Allium fistulosum / cepa), Common Sow Thistle/Haredylle (Sonchus oleraceus), Parsley /Persille, Rumex scutatus, Malva moschata and for the first time Mauka (Mirabilis expansa)….”
5th August: growing fast and keeping ahead of a courgette plant
5th August: growing fast and keeping ahead of a courgette plant
5th August: growing fast and keeping ahead of a courgette plant, with Allium cepa flowers
Harvesting on 27th October 2012, I had to remove the snow first
Pictures from Bergen in 2014:
Luxuriant Mauka in the Bergen Botanical Garden at Milde where I did a walk and talk in October 2014
…and I was surprised to find Mauka in the old botanical garden in Bergen (Museumsplassen) where it had been planted in the rock garden
I didn’t take many pictures on Sunday’s guided garden tour at the botanical garden in Bergen at Milde, but here are a few! I was very impressed in particular by the Andean vegetables including mauka and maca! Thanks to Heidi Lie Anderson, Bjørn Moe and, in particular, skilled Andean gardener in Bergen, Bodil Oma!
It was also great to have the chance to harvest and share the Gunnera (Nalca) leaf stalk….the verdict was that it was surprisingly good, sweetly acid flavour! Here’s an album of pictures I took of the amazing Nalca food forests of Chiloe Island in Chile (including being shown by a local how to eat it!): http://www.edimentals.com/pictures/index.php?/category/10
We were very pleased that over 100 people turned up for the Milde edimentals tour and all my heavy load of books were sold out!
Introduction and welcome from the garden’s Heidi Lie Andersen
After we sampled the Gunnera tinctoria from Chile (surprisingly tasty said several who tried!), and Vossakvann (the heirloom Norwegian selection of Angelica archangelica), we moved on to the South American garden where we saw an impressive bed of Mauka (Mirabilis expansa) with edible tubers and leaves!
The MACA (Lepidium peruvianum) also had impressively large roots! We also saw and talked about quinoa, Oca, Madeira vine and Canna edulis and Oca, before finishing with the multiple uses of caraway and, finally, Allium victorialis which has a large naturalised population at Granvin in Hardanger!
After the talk some of us went to Blondehuset in a different part of the garden for refreshments and nearby we found a nice patch of udo (Aralia cordata)
…and there were other edimentals in full flower, this diverse group of Hordalanders posed for me in front of a flowering Devil’s Walking Stick (Fandens spaserstokk) a great forest garden edible (Aralia elata) from the Far East!
Devil’s Walking Stick (Fandens spaserstokk)
Devil’s Walking Stick (Fandens spaserstokk) self-seeded (?) in a rock crack!
Chuño, Andean freeze-dried potatoes!
http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?page_id=677
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden