I always advise anyone who grows crops at home or aims to start a vegetable garden to include cut-and-come-again vegetables in their plot. These easy-to-grow foods provide long harvests of delicious homegrown vegetables for little expense – you can get pickings from plants for weeks or months during the season.
There are cut-and-come-again vegetables that continue to produce stems to harvest, and leafy plants that will develop new leaves as you pick the larger, mature ones to eat. And space needn’t be an issue, as there are cut-and-come-again vegetables you can grow in pots or window boxes if you aren’t blessed with a large vegetable garden.
I always featured many cut-and-come-again vegetables in the productive gardens I managed as a professional kitchen gardener. Whether I was growing and harvesting the crops for chefs or selling the produce to garden visitors, these plants offer rich bounties for the cost of just a few seeds. Here I have picked seven of the best cut-and-come-again vegetables for plots of any size.
(Image credit: Future/Jacky Hobbs )
Vegetables with multiple harvests vs cut-and-come-again crops
Not all crops that provide long harvesting seasons are cut-and-come-again vegetables. For example, the likes of beans, tomatoes, and cucumbers all provide harvests over many weeks (even months) during the season, but are not classed as cut-and-come-again.
I would also always have plants with multiple harvests like these on my planting plans for the year, as well as many cut-and-come-again vegetables from the following list:
7 of the best cut-and-come-again vegetables
This is by no means an exhaustive list of cut-and-come-again vegetables; as many crops can be harvested multiple times during one growing season in this way.
But if you are looking to plant vegetables to provide long pickings, you can’t go wrong with any of these crops.
1. Swiss chard
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I have always grown Swiss chard and have done so for many years, both in the kitchen gardens I worked in and on my home plots. It looks fantastic, is simple to grow, and gives a long supply of stems for many months.
Plant Swiss chard seeds in the spring for harvests from summer into fall, and in midsummer to pick once the first batch of plants starts to wane. You can overwinter chard by protecting it with fleece or cloches to extend the harvesting season through into the spring.
If you want to know how to harvest Swiss chard as a cut-and-come-again crop, simply pick individual leaves as you need them.
Harvest the older, outer leaves and cut the thick stems at the base with clean and sharp pruning shears or a sharp knife. This allows the younger inner leaves to continue growing.
See the range of Swiss chard seeds at Amazon
See the range of Swiss chard seeds at Walmart
See the range of Swiss chard seeds at Burpee
See the range of Swiss chard seeds at True Leaf Market
2. Lettuce
(Image credit: Getty Images/Wachirawit Iemlerkchai)
Lettuce is undoubtedly the most well-known cut-and-come-again vegetable, and usually the first one any grower starts with. This fast-growing vegetable can be grown in outdoor beds, vegetable container gardens, or windowsills for quick pickings of leaves to be added to salads or sandwiches.
Growing lettuce is super-simple and can be done throughout the year. You can start sowing in spring, either indoors or outdoors, and successively plant lettuce through to late summer. You can harvest lettuce once the leaves are large enough to use, which can be in as little as 30 days from sowing.
The best lettuces to grow as cut-and-come-again plants are loose-leaf types, rather than those that produce a typical head.
Or, you can find a blend of salad mix seeds, such as this gourmet blend of lettuce seeds on Amazon, which features a selection of loose-leaf varieties perfect for cut-and-come-again harvesting. Such seeds are suitable for growing lettuce in pots or raised beds.
3. Kale
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Kale is a superfood and a cut-and-come-again vegetable, meaning you can get long harvests of healthy leaves rich in vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants.
It is a cold-hardy crop that can overwinter in the vegetable garden, and the leaves will have a sweeter flavor after being touched by frost. But kale isn’t just a winter crop, and earlier sowings in spring can provide harvests from summer onwards.’
To harvest kale, cut individual outer leaves, starting from the base of the stem. Avoid taking more than a third of the leaves at any time, so the plant can keep producing new ones further up the stem, and don’t pick any from the top rosette.
If you have a smaller space and want to grow kale in pots, a compact variety such as dwarf blue curled kale grows to 16 inches and provides lots of leaves to pick. You can get dwarf blue curled kale seeds to sow at Burpee.
4. Broccoli
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When you grow broccoli, you get the main first harvest of a single head of densely-packed buds – aka the classic broccoli head you see in stores. But not everyone knows that it is not the only harvest, as the plant will continue to grow smaller side stems.
These side stems are delicious, and you can get three or four harvests of them before the end of the season. Stopping the plant from flowering is vital if you want the best broccoli harvests during the summer, ensuring the plant puts energy into producing these smaller stems rather than blooming.
These Green Sprouting Calabrese seeds from True Leaf Market are a great example of a variety that will provide bumper side-shoot harvests after cutting the main head.
Another good option for repeated harvests is to grow broccolini. This hybrid between traditional broccoli and Chinese broccoli produces lots of small, bite-sized stems over a really long period.
5. Asparagus
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This cut-and-come-again vegetable doesn’t have the speedy results many others on this list do, but the pain of a two-year wait for the first harvest is more than made up for by the lifespan of the perennial vegetable. You can grow asparagus for up to 20 years, getting a crop of tender spears each spring.
Plant asparagus crowns in early spring or fall in a sunny spot in the kitchen garden. This is the same if you are planting them in the ground, or growing asparagus in a container or a raised bed. You can grow asparagus from seed, but this requires an even longer wait for the first harvests
You do need to wait two years to start harvesting asparagus, or three if you planted seeds. When the spears appear in spring, start cutting them with a sharp knife once they reach 6-10 inches and are thicker than a pencil.
This cutting will encourage new spears to appear for future harvests. The harvesting window may be short at just 6-8 weeks, but they are a cut-and-come-again vegetable during this time and can be for many years to come.
You can get high-yielding ‘Mary Washington’ asparagus crowns at Amazon.
6. Rhubarb
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Rhubarb is usually thought of as a fruit, but it is technically a vegetable that can be included on this list of cut-and-come-again vegetables.
You can grow rhubarb in a sunny position on your plot for perennial harvests of tart stems for desserts, either by planting crowns or growing rhubarb from seed. A good clump of rhubarb can provide harvests for 10 years or more, and you can divide rhubarb plants to keep them productive and get new ones for free.
However, while it can be a cut-and-come-again vegetable, you actually don’t want to cut it. It is always better to harvest rhubarb by pulling and twisting the stems away from the plant; this is preferable to cutting it, which causes what’s left of the stalk to rot into the crown.
Keep pulling stems once they reach at least 10 inches, taking a few at a time, and the plant will continually produce new ones to pick throughout the season.
You can get ‘Victoria’ rhubarb crowns at Amazon to plant in your plot to enjoy harvests for years to come.
7. Arugula
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Arugula is one of the easiest vegetables to grow from seed for fast and multiple harvests. It is a popular crop on restaurant plates, and one that tastes best picked fresh from the garden rather than packaged off grocery store shelves.
You can start growing arugula in spring, and each plant can provide many pickings of peppery leaves for adding to salads, sandwiches, stir-fries and pasta dishes, or use as a garnish.
Picking individual leaves when required is the best way to harvest arugula. As with others on this list, harvesting the oldest leaves first once they are usable allows the younger leaves in the center to develop.
Arugula leaves get more bitter as they mature. Start picking once the leaves reach three inches, and don’t let them get past six inches. Take a few leaves off each plant at a time, and it will encourage smaller leaves to develop and new ones to emerge.
See the range of arugula seeds to plant at Amazon
See the range of arugula seeds to plant at Walmart
See the range of arugula seeds to plant at Burpee
See the range of arugula seeds to plant at True Leaf Market
Is spinach cut-and-come-again?
Yes, you can grow spinach as a cut-and-come-again vegetable to get multiple harvests from each plant. Simply harvest spinach by removing the outer leaves with pruning shears, a harvesting knife, or by pinching the stems between your fingers. Tasty baby spinach leaves are ready to crop around a month after sowing, and can be enjoyed raw, while it may be closer to two months before the time arrives to pick mature leaves.
Is bok choy cut-and-come-again?
When you grow bok choy, this oriental vegetable can be harvested as a cut-and-come-again vegetable. Taking some of the outer, thicker, and ribbed leaves and leaving the looser central ones allows the younger ones to develop, and the plant will regrow new leaves. It is important to leave the base intact when you pick. Cut the larger leaves close to the base, but keep around an inch of stem remaining.
While not a cut-and-come-again vegetable, there is a neat hack to get a second harvest from cabbage. When you harvest cabbage, cut the head from the stem, but leave the stem in the ground. Cut an ‘X’ into the top of the stem, and it will develop a second crop of smaller heads to harvest down the line.
This Fiskars harvesting knife has a precision-ground, stainless steel blade and can be used for quick cuts or to saw through thicker stems.
These Felco pruning snips have straight chromium blades and are ideal for cutting smaller stems of cut-and-come-again leafy greens.
These wire and wood baskets are perfect for picking and cleaning your harvest from the vegetable garden.