November 8, 2024, 1:53 pm | Read time: 4 minutes

Pak choi is an Asian cabbage vegetable with only a mild cabbage flavor and a slight mustard note. It is easy to grow in the garden. The tasty leafy stalk vegetable is ready to harvest after seven to ten weeks. If you don’t want to wait that long, you can also harvest after around four weeks. The leaves are then suitable for tender baby leaf salads.

What does pak choi look like?

This leafy stalk vegetable develops into loose heads. It has light to dark green, smooth leaves with lush white midribs that merge into broad leaf stalks. At their base, the stalks grow together, almost like tubers. There is a considerable range of varieties available. There are red-leaved varieties, different growth sizes, varieties with green stems, and varieties for different uses. It’s common for pak choi to be mistaken for Swiss chard. However, despite the visual similarity, the two vegetables are not related.

Location and soil requirements

Pak choi prefers a sunny to semi-shady location and nutrient-rich, loose, and calcareous soil. It is crucial to avoid waterlogging to ensure healthy growth.

Sowing

Depending on the variety, pak choi is sown from summer to fall. While sowing in spring is possible, it is less successful because the plants tend to bolt and form flowers quickly under unfavorable conditions. A good time for sowing is when the hottest days of the year are over, i.e., at the end of July to August at the earliest or even into September for some varieties.

The plants can be pre-grown or sown directly. Pre-planting makes sense if the beds are still occupied by other crops that will be harvested in the following weeks.

Container gardeners can also enjoy growing this Asian leafy delight. In contrast to Chinese cabbage, the vegetable can also be grown well in containers or balcony boxes.

Planting distance for dual use

Most pak choi varieties require a planting distance of 20-30 centimeters. As it can be harvested at any stage of growth, it is a good idea to sow or plant it closer together. After a few weeks, the plants are thinned out to the correct spacing. The resulting young plants are then best planted directly in the salad bowl as baby leaves.

Cultivation break and bed partner

Pak choi, along with other types of cabbage, radishes, rapeseed, and mustard, is a member of the cruciferous family. To prevent diseases such as the dreaded cabbage hernia, it is important to take breaks in cultivation. This means that after growing pak choi, neither pak choi nor any other cruciferous plant should be grown in the same area for several years. The recommendations for the break vary from a minimum of three to seven years.

Good neighbors for pak choi are lettuce or carrots. Other cruciferous plants and potatoes are unsuitable. It is renowned for its robustness as a vegetable. If the cultivation breaks are consistently adhered to, aphids and earth fleas are almost the only things that can cause trouble.

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Harvest and use

Pak choi is ready to harvest after seven to ten weeks. It has a mild cabbage flavor and a slight hint of mustard. Culinary use includes both the leaves and the stems. This vegetable is ideally suited for Asian cuisine, such as being briefly blanched or stir-fried. As the stems have a longer cooking time than the leaves, it makes sense to separate the two before preparation and cook the stems for longer. For those who prefer to harvest pak choi as baby leaves, the ideal time is around four weeks after planting. The young, tender leaves are great as a salad.