The thing that gets me excited about a new spring gardening season is the thought of eating produce from my very own garden. It’ll be some time before I can eat a salad grown entirely in my small urban plot. No tomatoes, peppers, or carrots will make it into the salad bowl until warmer days arrive. Cool-spring veggies are my salad savior, and there are plenty to choose from. One of my favorites is the Sweet baby radish.

I’ve written about radishes here before. I’ve grown a small, round, reddish variety for a few years now and it’s as reliable a crop as any out there. However, I’m excited to try my hand at a radish new to the market called Sweet Baby, an All-America Selections Regional Winner for the Southeast and Great Lakes regions. It’s not small, not round, and certainly not red.

Sweet Baby Radish

Sweet Baby is an elongated egg-shaped radish that grows to about 3 inches in length. Externally it’s a reddish-purple color with a streaked purplish-white flesh. That flesh is true to the finest of radishes with a crisp crunch and light spice.

As a crop, Sweet Baby radishes grow to a uniform size and all within the same growing window of about 40 to 45 days. Gardeners can plant a small row every week or two and look forward to an extended harvest. You could even top your tomato salad with some thinly sliced Sweet Baby radishes.

As I said, radishes are one of my first crops of the vegetable-growing season. Get out into the garden as soon as you can work your soil and direct sow seeds of Sweet Baby to a depth of ½ inch and a spacing of 1-½ to 2 inches. When their tops emerge and are large enough to grasp pull out every other plant to give the radishes more room to grow.

As for pests, keep an eye on flea beetles as they enjoy to munch on greens that have a bitter taste. To keep those at bay, cover the rows with a floating row cover just after sowing.