Cardoon

Did you know

• The cardoon is the wild ancestor of the globe artichoke—the artichoke is just a cardoon bred for fat flower buds instead of fleshy stalks.
• Its purple thistle flowers are as large as a fist and so striking that gardeners routinely grow cardoons just for the bloom and never harvest the edible stems.
• Cardoon flowers contain natural vegetable rennet, which has been used for centuries in Portugal and Spain to curdle milk for cheeses like Serra da Estrela and Torta del Casar—making them traditional vegetarian cheeses.
• The leaves are silver-blue and so dramatic that the plant is often used as a 5-foot architectural statement in Mediterranean gardens, even by people who never eat thistles.
• In Sicily, cardoon stems are battered and fried for Christmas Eve dinner—a tradition dating back to ancient Greek and Roman feasts where cardoons were prized above artichokes.

Color meanings

Uses

• Edible stems
• Architectural plant
• Ornamental gardens
• Cheese-making rennet