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Flip through any seed catalog and you’ll quickly discover that there are many types of lettuce to grow. Certain lettuces, like loose-leaf and oakleaf, are best enjoyed as baby greens while others, like iceberg and butterhead, are grown for their mature heads. Texture can also vary and some lettuces, like butterhead varieties, have tender, buttery leaves and others, like romaine, have crisp leaves for a satisfying crunch. In this article I’ll share the different types of lettuces and offer advice to help you choose the best ones to grow in your garden.
The best types of lettuce to grow
With so many types and varieties of lettuce available to gardeners (romaine, butterhead, loose-leaf, and iceberg to name just a few) it can be hard to pick which ones to grow. I base my decision on how I wish to eat the lettuce (baby greens versus full-sized heads), the time of year (cool, warm, or cold season), and if I’m planting them in pots or beds. Here are the seven types of lettuce to grow:
Butterhead lettuce
Butterhead lettuce is one of my favorite types of lettuce to grow (and eat!). I love the large buttery leaves that are often tinged in red or bronze and the delicate taste. Also called Boston or Bibb lettuce, butterhead varieties aren’t typically grown for a baby crop but instead for the mature heads of loosely folded leaves. They’re perfect for salads, wraps, burgers, and sandwiches. I plant at least a dozen varieties each spring and again in late summer for the longest possible harvest.
Varieties to grow: Pirat is an eye-catching variety with green leaves tinged in red. May Queen is a standout with gold-green leaves that are blushed in pink. Buttercrunch is a traditional and reliable variety that forms 5 to 6 inch diameter bright green heads. Tom Thumb offers a pint-sized harvest of 3 to 4 inch diameter heads, perfect for individual salads.
Romaine lettuce
This is one of the best types of lettuce to grow with the upright plants producing tightly folded heads of leaves. Romaine lettuces, or Cos, grow 6 inches to 2 feet tall, depending on the variety and the crisp leaves can be picked immature or full-sized. They can be green, red, or even speckled, and have a mild, sweet flavor. If you love Caesar salad, romaine is an essential crop to grow with the heads maturing 55 to 70 days from seeding.
Varieties to grow: Seed catalogs offer many excellent romaine lettuce varieties. Parris Island is the standard, but I’m also a big fan of Coastal Star, Flashy Trout Back, Outredgeous, Green Towers, Pomegranate Crunch, Jericho, Little Gem, and Winter Density.
Iceberg lettuce
Iceberg lettuce is also known as crisphead lettuce and is a classic salad type with compact heads packed with layers of pale green leaves. This is the most challenging type of lettuce to grow as most iceberg varieties are susceptible to bolting when the weather warms. To boost success I start the seeds indoors and transplant the seedlings into my garden in early spring. Also plant iceberg varieties in late summer for an autumn harvest. Expect crunchy, mild-flavored leaves with heads measuring 5 to 7 inches across. Because of its fussiness, iceberg lettuce isn’t as popular with gardeners as other types of lettuce.
Varieties to grow: I like Crispino, which yields large heads with good bolt-resistance. Red Iceberg, which as the name suggests, has bright red leaves that add welcome color to homegrown salads.
For more information on the different types of lettuces, watch this video:
Loose-leaf lettuces
Loose-leaf types, also called leaf lettuce, form loose mounds of ruffly green or red leaves. The plants are very quick to grow with baby leaves ready to pick just 35 days from seeding and full-sized heads two to three weeks later. Leaf lettuce is very easy to grow in raised beds or containers and you can plant it in bands, rows, or in-between slower growing vegetables like tomatoes, cabbage, and peppers. Harvest the leaves of loose-leaf varieties when they’re between 2 and 6 inches in length.
Varieties to grow: There are many outstanding leaf lettuces you can grow. My favorites include Black Seeded Simpson, a classic loose-leaf variety with lime green foliage, Red Sails, a gorgeous lettuce with crinkly reddish-green leaves, and New Red Fire, a heat-tolerant variety with frilly bronze foliage.
Oak leaf lettuce
Like loose-leaf lettuce, the plants of oak leaf varieties form loose, open rosettes of leaves. Enjoy them as baby greens or mature heads. They’re less frilly and crinkly than loose-leaf lettuces with deeply lobed foliage that looks like oak leaves. These lettuces are also fast-growing and you can start to pick leaves just five weeks from sowing. Mature heads are ready to cut in 50 to 55 days.
Varieties to grow: My two go-to oak leaf lettuces are Green Salad Bowl, a traditional green leaf variety that forms a dense mound of bright green leaves, and Red Salad Bowl, the burgundy leafed version of Green Salad Bowl. I also like to grow Sandy, an All-America Selections winner that is bolt-resistant and beautiful.
Lollo lettuce
Lollo lettuce is almost too pretty to eat! These varieties grow in dense, intensely curled rosettes with leaves that range from bright green to deep red. They’re slightly slower to grow than loose-leaf or oak leaf lettuces with baby leaves ready in 6 weeks and the plants maturing 8 weeks from seeding. They add loft to mesclun and baby leaf salads and you can start to harvest when the leaves are 2 to 3 inches in length. Because the plants have an open growth habit, it’s easy to continually pick the outer leaves which allows the center of the plant to keep developing.
Varieties to grow: Dark Red Lollo Rossa is the classic variety with deep red, super frilly foliage that hides a bright green heart. The attractive plants are pretty in pots or as an edge along a raised bed.
Summer crisp
Batavia and French crisp are other names for summer crisp lettuces which start off looking like loose-leaf lettuce but eventually form rounded heads as the plants mature. These are a combination of butterhead and iceberg types and gardeners love them because they’re easy to grow, versatile, and are both heat and cold tolerant. This is one of the best types of lettuce to grow in summer. Expect the leaves to have a mild sweetness and crunchy texture.
Varieties to grow: Chrystal is a lovely variety with bright green leaves sweetly blushed in red, while Magenta has gently wavy leaves in a pretty combination of bronze-burgundy.
The best types of lettuce to grow for baby greens
All types of lettuces can be picked as baby greens, but there are certain ones that perform better in terms of productively and earliness. These include loose-leaf, oak leaf, romaine, summer crisp, and lollo which produce baby leaves 4 to 5 weeks from germination. To harvest baby lettuce pick or clip individual leaves as soon as they’re 2 to 3 inches long. Continue until the crop is finished or the plants start to bolt. Bolted lettuce becomes bitter tasting and is best pulled and tossed on the compost pile.
The best types of lettuce to grow for full-sized heads
If it’s mature heads of lettuce you want, stick to one-cut types like butterhead, romaine, summer crisp, and iceberg. I harvest these lettuces by slicing the entire head off 1 to 2 inches above the soil surface. If watered and fertilized, the lettuce stub may regrow for a second smaller crop. Gardeners call this technique ‘cut and come again’. Or you can remove the head and then succession plant other types of vegetables in this space. For example, I like to follow a crop of spring lettuce with bush beans, cucumbers, or zucchini for summer harvesting.
The best types of lettuce to grow in garden beds
All lettuces perform well in garden beds so when I’m deciding which types of lettuce to grow I think about how I want to use the greens. I pick loose-leaf, oak leaf, or gourmet lettuce blends for baby greens. If I want full-sized heads I’ll opt for butterhead, romaine, or summer crisp varieties. I’ll also consider the season and for spring and autumn, I grow cool season varieties. If I’m aiming to harvest into summer it’s best to grow heat-tolerant varieties like those of summer crisp. I also enjoy having a supply of winter lettuce and chose cold season varieties like Winter Density and North Pole. I plant them grow best in season extenders like cold frames, greenhouses, and mini hoop tunnels.
The best types of lettuce to grow in containers
You can grow any type of lettuce in containers, but certain ones are easier to grow in pots. Loose-leaf and oakleaf lettuces are the quickest to grow. They’re picked at any stage between baby and mature leaf and are therefore ideal for pots. Heading lettuces need more time to mature and take up more space, but they can also be grown in containers or fabric planters.
Shallow-rooted lettuce plants don’t need a very deep container, especially if you’re growing a fast-growing crop of baby greens. For young plants, a depth of 6 to 8 inches is fine, but for larger heads, look for containers that are 8 to 10 inches deep. Pots, trays, and window boxes all work, but they need holes on the bottom so excess water can drain away. Fill containers with a blend of potting mix and compost, roughly two parts potting mix and one part compost.
For more information on growing lettuce, be sure to read these articles:
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