Too Many Beetroot Varieties

Beetroot are not a very diverse crop, and for many years I grew only one variety, not knowing if it was the best one to grow in this context. More recently I started to collect seed packets of different varieties from different suppliers, and probably end up with too many. After two large trials this past year, I can pick a few that seem like they would be useful to grow again, and perhaps this is good enough.

0:00 Not something known for variety
1:07 The most noble of all vegetables
2:47 Buying too many seeds
4:31 24 Varieties in a polytunnel
6:20 Comparing weight
7:24 Comparing Taste
9:30 24 varieties outside
11:38 Selecting varieties
13:17 Too many varieties?

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A fairly common crop for many gardeners  and growers are beetroot, or simply beets   in other parts of the world, and although  I’ve grown this vegetable for many years,   it’s not a crop that I’ve done a  lot of exploration with. Although  

There are a few different types of beetroot  available it’s not known for its diversity,   with most varieties seeming to be fairly similar,  if not interchangeable. Until fairly recently I   had been growing the same open pollinated variety,  one that I had randomly selected many years ago,  

As a general purpose beetroot. I never really  knew if it was a good choice, and I suspected   that some of the issues that I had with this crop  could be improved by using different varieties.   In the past few years I have also been growing a  hybrid variety, for harvesting as younger plants,  

But I wanted to do a proper variety trial similar  to what I have been doing with many other types of   vegetables. So I started to collect seed packets  of different beetroot varieties, and probably   ended up with way too many to properly compare,  but perhaps that made it easier to select a few.

I do like beetroot as a crop and enjoy eating  it, though I do want to explore additional ways   of using this vegetable in the kitchen. It is  a crop without any significant pest issues,   at least in this context, apart from birds and  slugs eating the seedlings. There have been some  

Disease issues, but not a lot in my experience,  or at least I was able to ignore the minor damage   that did occur. And I have not experienced plants  bolting, which seems to be more common in warmer  

Climates. Overall it is a fairly easy crop to  grow, if I can get it past the seedling stage,   and it can be really productive, and is easy to  store. I also like the fact that the entire plant   can be eaten at any stage in its development,  including seedlings or microgreens and early or  

Later thinnings. They are also great to  use as baby beets or semi-mature roots,   with their leaves still attached, or as fully  mature roots for storage, at least until they   start the process of developing seeds. And they  can be eaten raw or cooked, though that depends on  

Their quality and how well they were growing, and  of course on your taste preferences. Some beetroot   contain compounds that give it an earthy taste,  and some people seem to be more sensitive to this   and don’t like eating beetroot for this reason.  I don’t notice this earthy taste very much,  

But I have noticed another issue with a bitter or  astringent aftertaste from some of the beetroot   that I’ve grown, and sometimes it’s so bad that  it makes the beetroot inevitable. I’m not sure   the reasons for this problematic aftertaste,  but it might be due to poor soil development,  

Or nutrient deficiencies or imbalances in the  soil. It could also be due to inadequate watering   at times during the summer, but that’s not  really an issue most of the time here in Ireland. It is also possible that this occasional bad  taste was more common with the beetroot variety  

That I had been growing, and this was one of the  key reasons why I wanted to do a large variety   trial of beetroot, to see if some varieties were  more or less susceptible to acquiring this bad   flavour. I also didn’t know if the variety  I had been growing was the best option for  

Productivity or flavour, or at least how it  compared to other varieties that I could be   growing. I was also interested in exploring the  possible diversities with beetroot as a crop,   though I suspected there wasn’t going to  be much difference, at least not compared  

To crops like tomatoes which have a huge range  of different tastes, sizes, colours, shapes and   uses. So a few years ago I started to buy seeds  of different varieties from different suppliers,   but once I started to collect varieties it  was hard to determine when to stop. This was  

Also affected by Brexit, after which I would be  losing access to some really good seed suppliers   in the UK, which have variety suitable for this  climate, that are not available here in Ireland,   or from the other supplier that I started  to rely on in Germany. So I ended up with  

Seed packets of 24 different beetroot varieties  in total, which is a crazy amount, but I figure   I could at least store this collection in my  freezer for many years. I grew a trial of all   of these varieties in 2022 in a spare bed beside  the older poly tunnel but there were some issues  

With overshadowing at one end of the bed so some  of the varieties were not really comparable and I   didn’t pay enough attention or properly evaluate  all the varieties probably because there were so   many and it seemed like such a big task so I  decided to try again this past year in 2023  

With a full variety trial in one of the poly  tunnels and in one of the outside gardens. The beetroot variety trial that I grew in one of  the larger polytunnels was for an early crop of   semi-mature beetroot. This is a summer salad  crop, where the whole plant can be harvested  

When the roots have grown big enough to be used  in a number of different ways, and the leaves   and stems are still in really good condition.  I’ve had good success growing beetroot early in   the season in polytunnels like this in the past,  producing big yields of tender beetroot in late  

Spring or early summer. And with a lack of wind  and heavy rains in the shelter of the polytunnel,   the leaves and stems of these plants remained  in really good shape. I direct sowed the seeds   of all 24 varieties in one of the beds of  the polytunnel at the beginning of March,  

And to ensure full germination, I sowed several  seed clusters in each station, about 10 cm apart,   in short rows across the bed. I was aiming for one  cross row of about nine plants for each variety,  

With the row spaced about 25 cm apart, giving a  density of about 40 plants per square meter. At   both ends of this set of 24 rows, I left enough  space for an additional two rows of the usual  

Variety that I grow, to act as a buffer, to ensure  that each variety had similar growing conditions.   There was good overall germination, though there  were a few gaps especially with some varieties,   possibly due to poor quality seed. When we  thinned the seedlings, we tried to leave nine  

Plants for each variety to make up for any  gaps, but this wasn’t possible with some of   the varieties. The plants grew really well,  and we started harvesting a few plants from   each variety around the middle of May, about  10 weeks after sowing, and then we harvested  

Another batch from each variety about a week  later. And at the end of May we pulled up the   remaining plants of each of the varieties, so that  the bed could be used for other warm season crops.

The typical or median total weight produced by  each variety was just under 3 kg, or about 300   grams per plant, producing a total yield of almost  15 kg per square meter, which is a huge amount to  

Be able to harvest from just 3 months of growth in  the polytunnel in the spring. But some varieties   produce considerably more than others. I had tried  to harvest a comparable amount from each variety   at each harvest, but this wasn’t always possible  this variation probably contributed some of the  

Differences in yield between the varieties, as the  plants were able to grow quite a bit even in the   last week of growth. And the gaps in germination  definitely contributed to considerably lower   yields with a few of the varieties. So this yield  data from this one planting is not so reliable,  

But it is interesting to see that some  of the varieties produced considerably   more than the median or typical. And one open  pollinated variety and a hybrid variety produced   considerably more than the rest, at least in  this context when weight as a whole plant.

Of course weight or yield is not the only  factor. Appearance, quality and taste or   also really important, especially with a salad  summer crop like this. Four of the varieties   were a different colour or shape, and two of  the varieties were more elongated for pickling,  

Offering the only obvious diversity within the  selection. The other 18 were all variations of a   typical beetroot with roughly round, dark purple  roots, and striped purple stems, with bright   green leaves. We tasted a sample of all of the  varieties, but tasting 24 different raw beetroot  

Can be a bit of a challenge, and thankfully none  of them had that really strong aftertaste, that   can be difficult to get rid of. The two varieties  with yellow roots were quite interesting looking,   but didn’t taste good compared to the others  and were quite woody, and a variety with longer  

Pointed roots with white rings inside had quite an  unpleasant flavour. But another variety with white   roots and pink rings had a really great taste and  a soft texture, which was really nice to eat raw.   And the two longer varieties had a decent flavour,  which would serve as a good base for pickling.  

With the other 18 varieties, which all looked very  similar, there was a fair amount of variation in   the amount of sweetness and the depth of flavour.  A few of them did have traces of that bitter or   astringent aftertaste that I was keen to avoid,  and the taste lingered as we sampled others,  

So it was difficult to isolate the more we tasted.  It was a challenge to adequately evaluate them all   in this one sampling, and I think I would need to  do several tastings, possibly with more people,   and to try them all cooked, to figure out  which ones I really like the taste of for  

Different uses. It was interesting that the  variety that I had been growing for so many   years tasted quite good in comparison to the  others, and the yield was also relatively good,   so it seems I picked a reasonable variety all  of those years ago, at least for growing in  

This context. With the two varieties that produced  the heaviest crop, the hybrid variety also tasted   quite good but the open pollinated variety  tasted quite bland, which was disappointing. I repeated the same trial outside sowing  all of the varieties in one of the beds  

Of the No-Dig Garden at the beginning of June.  Unfortunately too many of the young seedlings   were eaten by slugs or birds, so I decided to  abandon this trial, and sowed the same trial   again in another bed of the No-Dig Garden at the  beginning of July. This delayed planting meant  

That it would not be a great crop for harvesting  as whole plants with good quality edible leaves,   which would have made it more comparable with  the trial in the polytunnel. But it was decent   timing for a crop of mature roots that we  harvested in late autumn for over winter  

Storage. Overall this crop was quite good with  a typical or median weight of about 2.75 kg for   each variety with an overall yield of about 11 kg  per square meter. These plants had grown through   the late summer and the full autumn and were  subjected to very different growing conditions,  

Compared to the plants growing in the polytunnel,  and there were a few issues with the roots. A rat   had chewed on a few of the roots, and I’m not  sure if this was just random or if the rat had   searched for the better tasting varieties.  A few of the varieties had split roots,  

And there was significant decay or rot with  some of the varieties, and less pronounced   decay with other varieties, and some of them  had other types of blemishes on the roots. All   of these would impact the storability or  usability of the roots, but with a single  

Small trial like this it’s hard to determine  whether this would be just a random occurrence,   but I’m tempted to assume that the varieties are  more susceptible to these kind of issues. Some   of the varieties had pronounced differences in  the size of the roots that we harvested, which  

May indicate a variability in the variety, which  isn’t necessarily a problem, and other varieties   were surprisingly uniform. With so many varieties  and a lack of time and capacity, I decided to mix   all of the varieties together, rather than keeping  them separate in storage, so that I could properly  

Evaluate them later. But with all of the roots of  the different varieties that we have eaten so far,   I haven’t noticed any of that bitter aftertaste  that I was hoping to avoid, so perhaps it is   more of an issue of growing conditions  and less dependent on variety selection.

It’s not so easy to select from so many different  varieties, but at least I can start to narrow down   the field based on these two trials. Between  the two longer varieties, I didn’t notice much   difference between yield and taste. So, if I  wanted to grow a patch specifically for making  

Sliced pickled beetroot I would probably select  the variety that was slightly less curved than   the other simply for making slicing a bit easier.  I didn’t like the taste of either of the varieties   with yellow roots. There are some serious  issues of rotting with the roots of one of them,  

And also seemed to be present in the roots of the  same variety that had grown in the polytunnel,   so I would definitely avoid that variety in the  future. But I might give the other one a second  

Chance if I can find some better quality seed.  I was not impressed with the variety with long   tapered roots, but the variety with roots that  had pink and white rings tasted really good,   and grew really well. Even with the one split root  and the rats sampling some of the others, this is  

Probably the only unusual coloured variety that I  would want to grow again. Among the 18 other more   typical varieties, the one hybrid variety is the  only one that really stands out with considerably   higher yields in both trials. The early plants of  this variety from the polytunnel were healthy and  

Strong with really good flavour, though perhaps  not the best tasting. The late season roots   were cleaner and in better shape than any other  variety, with no signs of blemishes or rotting   patches, and they were more consistently large  and well-shaped than the other varieties. And I  

Didn’t notice any woodiness or bitterness  with the one that I cut open and tasted,   and all of this makes the extra cost of the hybrid  seeds seem reasonable at least at this scale. Selecting an open-pollinated standard variety of  beetroot to grow is a bit more difficult. It may  

Be easier to first eliminate varieties that  had significant signs of rotting, cracking,   or had misshapen roots, inconsistent growth,  yellowing of the leaves, or had low yields,   or a poor taste. Even if some of this is more  of a random occurrence than something that is  

Typical of that variety, with so many to choose  from, it doesn’t really matter. This leaves about   eight open pollinated varieties of a typical type  of beetroot, that didn’t show any obvious issues   within these two trials. So that leaves only  really taste and yield differences to select  

Between them. The most productive of these open  pollinated varieties was quite bland tasting,   and the late season roots had one spot that  seemed to be starting to rot. A few that   tasted better and were reasonably productive  in the earlier cropping, didn’t yield so well  

In the late season crop, but it may still be  worth growing mainly as an early season crop,   and this includes the variety that have  been growing for many years. And there   is one that stood out as having really good  flavour in the single tasting that we did,  

And produced a reasonable yield of good quality  plants and roots in both trials. So this variety   might be the one to grow if I was to select  one open pollinated variety to rely on for my   main crop of standard beetroot. And that might be  good enough, at least in this context, possibly  

Together with the higher yielding hybrid variety,  a more interesting variety with ringed roots,   and a variety for pickling. But I might find that  in other gardens, with different soil profile   and fertility, or in a season with significantly  different weather, that these varieties might not  

Be the best options. But I’m really not going  to know unless I do additional large trials,   and I should probably figure out how well they all  store, and to spend the time to properly evaluate   how they taste. And perhaps with growing lots of  varieties in different contexts, I might finally  

Figure out what causes that bad aftertaste,  though I don’t really want to taste it again.