How to Grow Cabbage

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Cabbage is an amazing vegetable. Healthy, delicious, and easy to grow. It’s a cool-season crop that grows in spring or fall. Cabbage is low maintenance and can withstand pests fairly well. It’s a great addition to your vegetable garden. I hope you will grow cabbage this year

Growing Cabbage

And check out this month by month garden planning guide to help you know when to plant!

✔Here’s a link to a great vegetable garden planner you can print right out and use at home! So cute!

Growing up I only had it boiled and it was fairly off-putting in flavor and texture. As an adult, I learned to cook it in a way that I just LOVE. My kids tear cabbage up!

It’s so funny to imagine what you think kids will like, but if you have a good attitude about it, they will surprise you. Click here to see how I get my kids to eat healthy food.

Planting cabbage

It’s about time to be starting your plants indoors for this fall’s season in most places. So I want to talk about how to grow it. Cabbage is a Cole crop or cruciferous vegetable. It’s in the same family as broccoli, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts, kohlrabi, and kale. The procedure for growing all of these plants is very similar so use these instructions for all of them.

Cole crops can be grown from seed or started indoors and planted as a seedling, but the times seeds need to be germinated can be tricky where I live. Growing cabbage

Here in Oklahoma, cabbage seeds should be started around February or August for growing cabbage. In February, it’s too cold for seeds to germinate here and in August it’s way too hot. Because of this, it’s best to start your seeds indoors if your climate is like mine. Cole crop seeds like soil temperatures around 80 degrees. Check out your frost dates for when to plant.

Plant cabbage seeds about 1/4 inch deep, cover with soil and gently pat. Water well. 

Cole crop seeds take 3-10 days to germinate and 4-6 weeks to grow into a healthy seedling. If you don’t have a greenhouse, you will need supplemental lighting for your cabbage seedlings such as a grow light.

Once the cabbage seedlings are ready, plant your cabbage plants in the evening so they will have a chance to settle in before the harsh sun shines on them. Make sure to water them well to close up any air pockets that might be around the soil.

Plant cabbage plants about 12-18 inches apart in the garden so they will have room to grow.

Cabbage plants

Cabbage plants will form a big flower-like leaf pattern and in the center, a head will begin to form. As the head gets bigger it will get fuller and firmer until it’s ready to eat. You can choose whenever you’d like to harvest the head, but the longer you leave it, the more cabbage you will get.

Cut the head out of the center of the flower-shaped structure and leave the plant.

Many times you will get multiple smaller heads of cabbage on the second round of cabbage growth. It’s so fun to make your season last longer and get more from your harvest. Check out more garden wows.

It takes several months for the plant to produce a head of cabbage. It’s one of the most beautiful plants in the garden to me. I look at the plants like big gorgeous flowers, meant to delight me. THEY really do! I love growing cabbage!

What to do with home grown cabbage

My kids love cabbage and most of the time we prepare it the same way. This Heavenly Cabbage recipe is sure to please, but there are so many other ways to enjoy cabbage as well. You can fry it, roast it, make cabbage steaks, boil it, ferment it and enjoy it raw in salads like cole slaw. 

Check out:

• Traditional Irish Cabbage
• Sausage Cabbage Rolls without Nightshades

How to grow:

• Hot peppers and sweet peppers
• Sunflowers
• Cotton
• Jerusalem artichokes
• Luffa sponges
• Cabbage
• Wheat
• Sweet potatoes
• Asparagus
• Beans
• Potatoes
• Okra
• Brussel Sprouts
• Tomatoes
• Birdhouse gourds
• Kohlrabi
  

Need more help getting started in the garden?