Rampion
(Campanula Rapunculus). Both leaves and roots are used
in winter salads; the roots are also boiled. If the seed
be sown earlier than the end of May the plants are
liable to bolt. Choose a shady situation where the soil
is rich and light, and do not stint water. The rows need
not exceed six inches apart, and four inches in the rows
will be a sufficient space between plants.
Description
The roots are fleshy and biennial (but can be made perennial),
the stems are 2 to 3 feet high, erect, stiff, though rather slender, generally
simple, more or less covered with stiff, white hairs, which almost disappear
when cultivated. The leaves are variable, 1 to 3 inches long, the radical leaves
oblong or ovate, on long stalks and slightly crenate, the stem-leaves narrow and
mostly entire, or obscurely toothed. The flowers, which bloom in July and
August, are about 3/4 inch long, reddish purple, blue or white, on short
peduncles, forming long, simple or slightly branched panicles. The corolla is
divided to about the middle into five lanceolate segments. The capsule is short
and erect, opening in small lateral clefts, close under the narrow linear
segments of the calyx.
Culture
Culture is similar to the ordinary radish. Although a
biennial, the rampion plant will sometimes go to seed in a hot
summer. Therefore, for best results, it should be sown from
seeds early. Rows should be spaced 9 inches apart, with 3-4
inches between plants. Seeds are available in herb seed
catalogs.
Use
Roots may be cooked or eaten raw, as are some
forms of radish, and the tops may be eaten raw in salads or as a
cooked green. An old recipe suggests the roots should be boiled
and stewed with butter and oil and sprinkled with black pepper.
The flavor is more sweet and nutty than radishes. The roots
often are scraped before using and stored in the refrigerator
for later use.
Folklore
There is an Italian tradition that the
possession of a rampion excites quarrels among children. The
plant figures in one of Grimm's tales, the heroine, Rapunzel,
being named after it, and the whole plot is woven around the
theft of rampions from a magician's garden.
