| Leek | ||||||||||||||||
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| Allium ampeloprasum var. porrum (L.) J.Gay |
Leek is the common name for an edible, bulbous, biennial, herbaceous, Allium ampeloprasum var. porrum (also classified as Allium porrum, characterized by broad, flat, dark green leaves wrapped around each other, a thick white stalk, and a slightly bulbous root. It belongs to the same genus as the onion and garlic. Two related vegetables, the elephant garlic and kurrat, are also variant subspecies of Allium ampeloprasum, although different in their uses as food.
The edible part of the leek plant is sometimes called a stem, though technically it is a bundle of leaf sheaths.
Description
Onions are variously placed in the flowering plant family Alliaceae or Liliales. Alliaceae, a family of herbaceous plants, are monocots and part of order Asparagales. The family has been widely but not universally recognized; in the past, the plants involved were often treated as belonging to the family Liliaceae, and still are by some botanists. The Liliaceae, or the lily family, is a family of monocots in the order Liliales. Plants in this family have linear leaves, mostly with parallel veins, and flower parts in threes. The lily family traditionally was a paraphyletic "catch-all" group that included a great number of genera that are now included in other families, such as those now placed in Alliaceae.
Allium is the onion genus, with about 1250 species, making it one of the largest plant genera in the world. They are bulbous plants that produce chemical compounds (mostly cystein sulfoxide) that give them a characteristic onion or garlic taste and odor, and many are used as food plants. The flowers form an umbel at the top of a leafless stalk. The bulbs vary in size between species, from very small (around 2–3 mm in diameter) to rather big (8–10 cm). Some species (such as Welsh onion, A. fistulosum) develop thickened leaf-bases rather than forming bulbs as such.
Most bulbous alliums increase by forming little bulbs or "offsets" around the old one, as well as by seed. Several species can form many bulbils (tiny bulbs) in the flowerhead; in the so-called "tree onion" (A. cepa Proliferum Group) the bulbils are few, but large enough to be used for pickling.
Members of the genus include many valued vegetables such as onions, shallots, leeks and herbs such as garlic and chives. A strong "oniony" odor is characteristic of the whole genus, but not all members are equally flavorful.
Rather than forming a tight bulb like the onion, the leek produces a long cylinder of bundled leaf sheaths which are generally blanched by pushing soil around them (trenching). They are often sold as small seedlings in flats which are started off early in greenhouses, to be planted out as weather permits. Once established in the garden, leeks are hardy; many varieties can be left in the ground during the winter to be harvested as needed.
Cultivars
Leek cultivars can be subdivided in several ways, but the most common types are "summer leeks", intended for harvest in the season when planted, and overwintering leeks, meant to be harvested in the spring of the year following planting. Summer leek types are generally smaller than overwintering types; overwintering types are generally more strongly flavored.
Growing
Leeks are easy to grow from seed and tolerate standing in the field for an extended harvest. Leeks usually reach maturity in the autumn months, and they have few pest or disease problems. Leeks can be bunched and harvested early when they are about the size of a finger or pencil, or they can be thinned and allowed to grow to a much larger mature size. Hilling leeks can produce better specimens.
Cuisine
The edible portions of the Leek are the white onion base and light green stalk. The onion-like layers form around a core. The tender core may be eaten, but as the leek ages the core becomes woody and better replanted than eaten. Leeks are an essential ingredient of cock-a-leekie and vichyssoise. They can also be used raw in salads, doing especially well when they are the prime ingredient.
Because of their symbolism in Wales (see below), they have come to be used extensively in that country's cuisine, while in the rest of Britain leeks have only come back into favour in the last fifty years or so, having been overlooked for several centuries[1].
Historical consumption
Dried specimens from archaeological sites in ancient Egypt, as well as wall carvings and drawings, led Zohary and Hopf to conclude that the leek was a part of the Egyptian diet "from at least the 2nd millennium B.C.E. onwards." They also allude to surviving texts that show it had been also grown in Mesopotamia from the beginning of the 2nd millennium B.C.E.[2] The leek was the favorite vegetable of the Emperor Nero, who consumed it most often in soup.
Cultural Significance
The leek is one of the national emblems of Wales, whose citizens wear it - or the daffodil - on St. David's Day. According to one legend, King Cadwaladr of Gwynedd ordered his soldiers to identify themselves by wearing the vegetable on their helmets in an ancient battle against the Saxons that took place in a leek field. This story may have been made up by the English poet Michael Drayton, but it is known that the leek has been a symbol of Wales for a long time; Shakespeare, for example, refers to the custom of wearing a leek as an "ancient tradition" in Henry V. In the play, Henry tells Fluellen that he is wearing a leek "for I am Welsh, you know, good countryman". The 1985 and 1990 British One Pound coins bear the design of a leek in a coronet, representing Wales.
Perhaps most visibly however is the leek's use as the Cap badge of the Welsh Guards, a Regiment within the Household Division of the British Army.
Two blooming flower heads
A largely spent flower head showing open flowers as well as developing seed pods.
See also
- Wild leek, also known as ramps
- Leekspin
- List of vegetables
- Culture of Wales
Notes
- ↑ Jane Grigson, Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book, (Penguin Books, 1978, ISBN 0140468595) p 291
- ↑ Daniel Zohary and Maria Hopf, Domestication of plants in the Old World, third edition (Oxford: University Press, 2000),p. 195
External links
- Allium ampeloprasum L. on US National PLANTS Database
- Allium porrum L. on US National PLANTS Database
- Allium ampeloprasum, Porrum on Floridata
- Leek: Plants For a Future database
- Food Museum page
Credits
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