Are Leeks Still Edible After They Have Flowered?

on October 1, 2022

Leek is an extremely popular winter vegetable that is grown in a wide number of different countries. It has become a staple in European cuisine and has been eaten for thousands of years because it can tolerate relatively cold winters. This means that it is available to eat in a period of the year when there is not much else growing. However, one of the most common questions that is asked is can you still eat leeks after they have flowered?

Theoretically it is possible to eat leeks after they have flowered, however, one of the problems associated with this is that once flowering has occurred the leeks will create a flower stem. The flower stem will create a solid piece of stem through the center of the leek which is typically too hard to eat and is often difficult to even cut through.

So you are far better off to pick the leeks earlier and store them rather than wait until the leeks have flowered. Generally, leeks will store quite well for an extended period of time provided that they are stored in a cool dark location that is relatively dry.

If they are stored at temperatures below 40F leeks will typically last 3,4, or even 5 months depending upon the specific variety and conditions in which they are stored. Obviously, if you store leeks at higher temperatures the rate at which they deteriorate is generally faster.

Additionally, to extend the life of leeks in storage it is also a good idea to avoid storing them near ethylene producing foods such as apples, bananas, and pears as this will accelerate the deterioration of the leeks.They ideally should not be stored long term in a refrigerator.

What To Do With Leeks That Have Flowered?

Leeks that have already flowered only have a few useful applications. The first is to allow for plants to produce seeds for next year. To do this you need to wait until the flower has started to dieback and is beginning to release its seed.

The easiest way to collect the seed is to place a paper bag over the seed head and then shake it or run your hand over the top of the flower head to release all the seeds. Once collected the seed should be stored in a cool dark location until you are ready to plant them into the garden.

The second use for leeks that have flowered is to remove the upper foliage and give it to chickens as food or use it in dishes yourself, however, it is a good idea to taste it first to ensure it has not gone bitter. The final option is to simply remove the leeks and put the entire plant into the compost heap.

How Do I Know When To Pull Leeks?

Leeks like all members of the onion family can be pulled from the garden at any stage once they are large enough to eat which is typically when the stems are approximately as thick as a pencil. However, most people generally wait much longer than that before pricing leeks.

However, if you have access to leeks in the garden it is best to pull them in early spring as typically leeks that have been planted in the previous season and growing throughout the winter will likely produce flowers in the middle of spring to late spring at which point the quality will deteriorate.

When removing the leeks from the garden remove the top growth about an inch or two above the main stem as it will die back anyway.

How To Stop Leeks For Bolting

The formation of flowers is often referred to as bolting, most commonly occurs as the plant is aging. When a plant bolts is dependent upon whether it is an annual, biennial, or perennial plant. In the case of leeks they are biennial plants which means that they grow and develop in the first year and flower in the second.

As a result of this most gardeners take advantage of this growth habit by planning seeds in summer and allowing the plants to grow through the winter period as the weather is cooling down which makes a crop available throughout the winter to pick.

However, once the plant has been through this cycle there is a high degree of certainty that the plant will flower in the following spring when the weather starts to warm up but there are a few things you can do to slow down the rate at which the plant bolt.

The first thing you can do is ensure that the plant has adequate water and does not dry out as stress will often lead to the creation of flowers. To help this it is advisable to apply an additional layer of mulch in late winter to ensure that the soil can retain as much moisture as possible.

The application of mulch at this time of year is also beneficial as an insulator because leeks that are exposed to freezing temperatures during the winter are also far more likely to produce flowers as soon as the weather warms up and the days get longer.

The second important step is to limit the amount of light that the plant receives by placing a shade cloth above the plants. This will inhibit the growth rate and therefore the development of flowers.

How To Grow Leeks

Leeks that are planted are relatively easy to grow for most gardeners, however, one of the biggest mistakes that pretty much every beginner gardener makes when planting winter vegetables is that they simply plant them too late in the growing season.

Leeks are winter vegetables that can tolerate extremely low temperatures in the middle winter and still survive, however, they still require reasonable temperatures to grow so if you plant seeds too late in the growing season when the weather is warm the plant will not have sufficient time to get to its full size before the weather begins to cool down.

The effect of this is that many people end up with nothing to eat in winter because the plants will sit in the cold weather and not grow at all until the following spring at which point they are highly likely to bolt. So the most important thing in growing leeks is timing of the seed planting.

Seeds need to ideally be planted at the height of summer, if you wait until autumn it is typically too late to get a harvest in the winter, however, this is highly dependent upon the particular climate in which you live.

Due to the timing of the planting seeds there is often very little space in the garden available because you are busy growing other things such as tomatoes and cucumbers. As a result of this most people generally plant leek seeds into seed trays.

To do this start by filling the seed trays with a good quality seed raising mix and firm the mixture into each individual cells to create solid plugs. Plant 5 to 6 seeds per cell at a depth of approximately half an inch.

The number of seeds you are planting per cell may seem a little bit high, however, leek is a vegetable that lends itself to being planted in clumps in the technique known as multi-sowing. The advantage of growing leeks in a clump is you can fit more seeds into the seed tray and it is also much faster to plant the seedlings and out into the garden.

Additionally, multi-sowing will often produce a high yield with less maintenance because you can plant the clumps further apart and still get a reasonable yield. This means that you can use a hoe to weed between the plants rather than hand wedding which is much faster.

Once the seeds are planted they will typically take 10 to 14 days to appear and they will typically need to spend approximately 6 weeks in the seed tray, however, leaving the seedlings in the tray for longer is unlikely to inhibit the progress very much.

Transplanting Seedling Into The Garden

Once the seedlings are large enough to plant out into the garden they should ideally be placed in a warm sunny location that gets at least 6 hours of sun per day. At the time of year when you are typically need to plant leeks out into the garden there is usually not a lot of space in the garden so you can use a technique called interplanting. This technique entails placing the small seedlings in between the more mature summer crops that are about to be removed in the next few weeks.

This method allows the seedling to be established more quickly and ensures that you make the most of your available space in your garden.

When transplanting the clumps into the garden they should ideally be placed approximately 8 to 10 inches apart as this will allow you to run a dutch hoe between the clumps easily. At this point in time it may be necessary to thin out some of the leeks in the clumps so that you only end up with 4 to 5 leeks in a clump.

This is important because the individual leeks will not get to a reasonable size if there are too many plants in a clump

Once the leeks are in position it is important to ensure that they watered regularly, particularly early on when the weather is more likely to be warm and there is generally less rain about. Typically, you do not have to do a great deal of watering from mid-autumn onwards as natural rainfall in most regions will provide sufficient moisture.

Harvesting Leeks

Ideally, leeks will have reached the point where you can potentially pick them by the end of autumn when the weather is starting to cool down because by this time they should have ideally reached full size.

However, if you are not ready to harvest the leeks they can simply sit in the garden for an extended period of time in most regions without the need to pull them from the garden. The only time I would pull leeks from the garden is when the ground is going to freeze solid simply because it will be extremely difficult to get the leeks out of the ground when you want them.