Vegetables in
Your Ornamental Garden
By William D. Adams
Before you set out the first transplant be sure to add lots of organic matter to the soil. Vegetables demand high fertility and the more compost you can add, the better your production of both flowers and vegetables will be. If you’re building new beds then till it in. In beds where you already have established perennials and shrubs you will have to settle for a topdressing of the area with compost. Just remember the gardener with the most compost wins!
Texas gardeners have two seasons to consider when it comes to annual flowers and vegetables — warm season plants and cool season plants. The following vegetables are recommended for their ornamental as well as culinary qualities.
- Peppers can range from the subtle and mild, like a green bell pepper, to the racy and wild like the habanero. Whereas the typical bell pepper is little more than a small green shrub, other sweet peppers can be very ornamental especially the ramshorn types like Laparie or the colored bells like Golden Summer. Hot peppers are even more brightly colored and varied. There’s the super hot habanero, hot cayennes, serranos and chile pequins. Most of our spring planted vegetables die out in mid-summer but peppers will survive the Texas heat if they’re mulched and provided with a lot of water. In fact, they often look better in the fall than they did in the spring. Also consider using the ornamental peppers that under 12-14 inches in height with striking yellow, orange and red fruits. Be careful with these, they are typically very hot. Try blending pepper plants with zinnias, marigolds, lantana and gomphrena.
- Cherry tomatoes look like small Christmas ornaments in the garden. Wire cages are OK for the vegetable garden, but in the flower bed use bamboo poles, an antique lightning rod or three sections of cemetery wire fencing to contain their growth. Try varieties like Porter, Yellow Pear or Sweet Chelsea. You’ll need big vigorous flowers like amaranth, Indian Summer rudbeckia and tithonia to compete with an indeterminate (tall growing) tomato variety.
- Eggplant is another member of the tomato family that is just as pretty to look at as it is to eat. Listada de Gandia and Purple Rain look like they were chiseled out of marble. They’re almost too pretty to eat, but don’t just admire them, they taste good, too. Thai Long Green may not be as pretty but it is wonderful in the kitchen. You might also want to try the long purple varieties like Pingtung Long. White eggplants are gorgeous in the garden, but the skins seem to be a bit tough in the kitchen.
- Climbing spinach is perfect for the tropical garden. It is a strong growing, vine-like plant that will cover 10-15 feet in a year but since it doesn’t twine or have tendrils, you will have to tie the stems to a trellis to support it. The leaves taste like spinach—they’re just a little slick, but they go down quick.
- Bitter Melon was offered as an ornamental (Balsam Pear) in seed catalogs long before it became popular as an Asian vegetable. If left to mature it will turn yellow and split open to reveal seeds with a beautiful red covering.
- Tromboncino squash looks like a pale zucchini, but it has a rich, buttery flavor. It also makes a strong vine that can be quite attractive on a trellis. Best of all, you will love it in the kitchen.
- Burpless cucumbers can make for an interesting accent in an otherwise color-splashed flower border. One or two vines should be enough to harvest for lots of salads. Combine these vines with morning glories, cypress vine, Black-eyed Susan vine or passion vine. These ornamentals will smooth out the coarseness of plants like cucumber and squash so your guests will hardly guess that you have a practical side.
- Sunchokes used to be called Jerusalem Artichokes, but since they’re really an American sunflower, they needed a name change. This is definitely a background plant, growing 5-8 feet tall with attractive yellow flowers in the fall. About the same time, they begin to develop underground tubers that are quite delicious and good for you, too. Be sure you don’t dig them and leave them to cure like you would potatoes—they get rubbery and stay that way. The best plan is to leave them in the ground over winter and dig a few as needed or put them in plastic bags and store them in the ‘frig. They’re actually better after a bit of cold storage. The chokes can be used fresh in salads or they can be cooked or pickled.
- Ornamental herbs like basil, Mexican marigold mint, Mexican oregano (Poliomentha), oregano and rosemary look super in the flowerbed, as well.
- Cabbage family vegetables love our Texas winters. Try Savoy cabbage, purple broccoli and green cauliflower, or for a vertical accent, set out a few plants of Brussels Sprouts. Look for the early hybrids when it comes to variety selection. And don’t be afraid to fertilize cool season vegetables, most are heavy feeders. They also take lots of room, so allow for a 24-36 inch spread. The ornamental cabbages and kales that are so popular for flowerbeds are just fancy cabbages that make a great garnish or salad ingredient.
- Lettuce is a must have in the flower border. Some of the red-leaf varieties like Red Sails and Ibis rival the best of our winter annuals in the “looks” department. Even the green varieties come in a variety of shades and textures. Romaine lettuce can be used as another vertical accent. Don’t be surprised if your vertical accents quickly end up in a Caesar salad, however.
- Radicchio is another salad candidate from the Chicory family. It’s not only drop-dead gorgeous in the garden, it has a mild, slightly bitter flavor that adds zing to a salad, and it can cost $5.00 a head if you buy it at the store.
- Globe artichokes and a close relative, cardoon, make beautiful background accents in the winter flower border in south Texas where they thrive through the winter and early spring. These big thistles with their gray-green, deeply incised leaves are hard to ignore in any planting. In the spring you can harvest the chokes or let them develop into huge purple flowers. Cardoon is grown for the tender leaf petioles that are scraped of the tough outer covering. The petioles are then cut into chunks, par-boiled, battered and fried. Finally, they are sprinkled with fresh Parmesan—ready to be dipped into Marinara sauce.
- Miscellaneous greens might include a Mesclun mix of tangy, young salad greens like arugula, cress, mustard, chervil, endive and mizuna, or you might want to grow them separately—especially the vigorous ones like arugula, mizuna and Deer tongue lettuce. Combine them at will for a different salad mix every day.
- Swiss Chard is simply a beet that is grown for its mild-flavored leaves. It is one of the most striking vegetables you will ever plant in the garden or flowerbed. From Central Texas, south—it thrives through most of our winters. If you lose it in a hard winter, plant again about the time of the last frost in your area and it will thrive until the heat of summer takes it out. Varieties with green, white, yellow and red petioles including Bright Lights, Lucullus and Vulcan are available from nurseries or seed catalogs.
- Ornamental herbs for the cool season include fennel (green or bronze), parsley, chives, cilantro, red celery, dill, salad burnet and thyme.
- Combine these cool season veggies with pansies, violas, dianthus, nasturtiums, snapdragons, calendulas, sweetpeas, larkspur, cornflowers and hollyhocks for a horticultural treat that’s both visual and delicious.
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