Spinach

Spinacia oleracea · Leafy green

40 pairings

Spinach (Spinacia oleracea) is a fast-growing leafy annual whose tender, deep-green leaves are eaten raw in salads or wilted down to a fraction of their volume by heat. Mild, faintly sweet and grassy when young, it turns earthy, minerally and slightly astringent as it matures — that mouth-drying edge the signature of its oxalic acid.

Picking a good onedrag

Squeaky, just cut, standing upYellow, limp, slimy at the stem

Shop freshThe all-rounder: raw, wilted in butter, or into soup.Everyday best

LeafGreen, blades relaxed but still flat

The drapeSoft in the hand, still lifting

Cut stemsCut ends drying, crowns still firm

Smell at the leafGreen and neutral, almost nothing

What to look for, from squeaky, just cut, standing up to yellow, limp, slimy at the stem.

What one gives you

72%

Usable yield

340 g · large stems and roots off

472 g

Typical weight

one specimen

Keeping ittap a band

A domestic fridge holds it about 7× longer than the counter.

Humidity

95-100%

Near-saturated: a damp cloth or a lidded box. The leaf is nearly all water, and bare fridge air limps a bunch inside a day.

Airflow

Vented, never sealed

A perforated bag, never sealed: spinach breathes harder than almost any leaf, and trapped damp starts soft rot at the cut stems.

Yellows beside ripening fruit

Spinach makes almost no ethylene of its own but is highly sensitive to it: a bowl of apples or bananas nearby yellows the leaves within days.

Preparing