Ag Opportunities

Volume 20, Number 11
November 2009

Introducing New Vegetables to Urban Consumers
Local researchers and farmers are trialing specialty vegetables for niche markets.
By Ted Carey
Vegetable Extension Specialist, K-State Research and Extension

There seems to be a trend toward greater diversity in the American diet. Just watch the Food Channel, look in the produce section of most any grocery store, visit a farmers market, flip through a seed catalog, or visit an urban farm and you’ll almost certainly find vegetables that you wouldn’t have seen ten years ago. Often these new vegetables first appear in response to demand by immigrants yearning for a taste of their own foods. With time these foods may become popular among the general population, presenting vegetable growers with opportunities to satisfy new markets.

Over the last couple of seasons, in partnership with KCCUA, urban farmer Sam Davis and others, we’ve been exploring the potential for growing and selling a couple of little-known vegetable crops: sweet potato greens and moqua (hairy melon). We chose these crops through a participatory process which considered the potential of various crops to appeal to mainstream markets and to be productive in our Midwestern climate. Sweet potato greens are a widely consumed vegetable in some parts of the world--Southeast Asia, Oceania, and parts of Africa in particular--but completely unknown or rejected as a vegetable in others. Because I have an ongoing sweet potato variety evaluation and selection program, it seemed an easy next step to evaluate vines for leafy green production and suitability for use as a leafy green vegetable.

Moqua (Benincasa hispida) is a cucurbit that tastes a bit like a cucumber, can be eaten raw or cooked, and that, unlike a cucumber, retains its texture when cooked. To some it may look a bit strange but we thought that its culinary quality could win over new consumers. I should mention that both sweet potato greens and moqua are regularly sold at relatively low prices in Kansas City's Asian grocery stores where they arrive from distant places. Still we thought there might be a broader market for these crops, with some consumers willing to pay a premium for local, fresh and organic selections.

To start our sweet potato evaluation, we asked a couple of experts, Grace Kipp--a local Taiwanese chef--and Lile Merrill--originally from Tonga--to help us select a few varieties to evaluate. Not surprisingly they looked for tender, smooth (not hairy) shoot tips and leaves. Though it wasn’t the best looking, we included the widely grown commercial variety, Beauregard, because it is readily available to local growers and gardeners. We also picked up a bag of the commercially available sweet potato greens, smooth and bright green, at an Asian grocery store and multiplied them for inclusion in our trials. We distributed sets of varieties to each of our partners and also grew them ourselves. We grew them in raised beds, planted quite densely in order to have a thick canopy of shoot tips to harvest. Some of our partners regularly harvested and sold sweet potato vines at market, providing their customers with advice on preparation. And we made up a recipe and an evaluation sheet which we gave out along with free samples to visitors at our research and extension center and to customers of our student farm.

During the growing season, we evaluated the production of the sweet potato varieties in our plots, observing large differences between them with respect to leafy green production based on growth habit and vigor.

We took a similar approach with moqua, assembling all the varieties that we could find for evaluation including cultivars from Kitazawa Seed Co., Evergreen Y.H. Enterprises, and Johnny’s Selected Seeds. We grew transplants and gave them to our partners with the recommendation that they trellis these vining crops. Our vines grew quickly, and we have had a heavy harvest of these hairy gourds with notable differences among varieties. As with sweet potato greens, we developed recipes and an evaluation sheet to give out with free samples to assist in the promotion of this vegetable and to ask for feedback.

As a culmination of efforts for the season, we organized a sweet potato and moqua-themed tasting party where we invited people to bring dishes featuring these crops, and where we had a controlled (more or less) taste test of all eleven sweet potato varieties, cooked two ways: (1) blanched and (2) lightly fried with a bit of olive oil, garlic and a squeeze of lemon juice. The samples were number-coded and tasters evaluated each variety, and had access to saltines and water to cleanse their palates between samples. At the end of the exercise, we revealed the names of the varieties and discussed them using a flip chart. Tasters could distinguish among the varieties, clearly liking the variety from the grocery store, another variety called Diane, and also liking the leaves of a purple fleshed selection from our breeding program.

Coincidentally, the favored varieties are also a great producer of vines, prolifically producing many shoots for a continuous harvest. Beauregard, however, may not be a good choice for producers of sweet potato greens as it did not stand out in the taste test and was not a prolific vine producer either. We did not do a controlled taste test of moqua, but many consumers were pleased and excited to try this new vegetable.

The trials and initial customer feedback make us optimistic about the market potential of these vegetables among new customers. We will continue efforts to popularize sweet potato greens and moqua by working with growers as well as with chefs seeking to include them on their menus.

Reach Ted at tcarey@ksu.edu