A surprising Italian interior beetroot — when cut, it reveals concentric red and white rings of striking decorative beauty.
About the variety. Chioggia is an old variety with round roots, light red skin, and a sweet flavour that is less earthy than traditional beetroot. Important note: the rings lose their colour and turn yellow once cooked, so it is best enjoyed raw.
Itinerário técnico
Como cultivar beetroot chioggia?
Um guia de cultivo passo a passo, da sementeira à colheita.
pH ideal 6.5 to 7.5Temperatura ideal 15 to 22 °CCompasso 10 to 15 cm in the row, 30 to 35 cm between rows
Sementeira
Sow direct two or three centimetres deep in rows. Each seed is a cluster containing several seeds, so groups of three or four plants always come up and thinning is compulsory: leave one every ten or fifteen centimetres. Not thinning gives small deformed roots. Soaking the seed for twelve hours improves and evens up germination. Sow small amounts from March to July in the south and from April to June in the north, to have tender roots for months. At about 30 centimetres tall, this variety grows well in a pot twenty centimetres deep with drainage holes.
Solo
It wants loose, deep, free draining soil at a pH between 6.5 and 7.5, and dislikes acidity. No fresh manure. Compacted soil gives small twisted roots. It tolerates some salinity, which suits it to gardens near the sea. In acid soil, correct with lime or wood ash the previous autumn.
Clima
It grows well between 15 °C and 22 °C and takes moderate heat and light frost. Sowing too early, with a long cold spell below 10 °C, makes the plant bolt without forming a root, which is the classic spring mistake. It adapts to most of western Europe. On the Portuguese coast and in southern Spain use spring and autumn and avoid the peak of summer. In the south, a July sowing gives the storage beetroot for winter. Inland in Iberia water more through the dry months. In France and Germany the natural season is spring and summer, sowing once the soil has warmed steadily. In Italy the same rule applies as in the rest of the Mediterranean: spring and autumn in the centre and south, spring and summer in the north.
Fertilização
Do not use fresh manure or strong nitrogen feeding: that gives forked, hairy and tasteless roots. Use a bed that was composted for the previous crop and top up potassium only, with sieved wood ash, which improves sweetness and keeping quality. If the leaves turn small and reddish halfway through the cycle, one watering with a liquid organic feed puts it right.
Rega
Water regularly and consistently. Swinging between drought and heavy watering splits the roots and forms hard white rings inside. Evenly moist soil gives tender sweet roots. In the hot months, a straw mulch between the rows keeps moisture steady.
Controlo de Infestantes
Hoe often and always shallowly, because the roots are short, near the surface and break easily. The best method is to prepare the bed two or three weeks in advance, let the first flush of weeds germinate, remove it and only then sow: that gives you a decisive head start. A thin layer of sieved compost between the rows greatly reduces later work.
Controlo de Pragas
Slugs and snails are enemy number one for this crop and can clear a whole sowing in one damp night. Use barriers of ash, eggshell or sawdust around the bed, collect them at night with a torch and fall back on ferric phosphate if needed. Aphids settle in the heart of the plant and are hard to wash out later: apply potassium soap at the first sign and encourage ladybirds and hoverflies with flower strips. Leaf miner draws pale tunnels in the leaf, which are simply removed by hand. Thrips and flea beetle attack mainly in dry warm weather.
Doenças
Cercospora makes round dark bordered leaf spots in warm humid weather. Rhizoctonia rots the root in waterlogged soil. Downy mildew covers the leaves with a grey felt in damp weather: space well and water at the base. Boron deficiency, common in chalky and sandy soils, gives a black heart inside the root: prevent it with compost and seaweed. Use a three year rotation away from chard and spinach.
Colheita
Lift when the root is five to eight centimetres across: at that point it is tender and sweet. Beyond that size it goes fibrous and woody. Twist the leaves off rather than cutting close, because a cut at the crown makes the root bleed and lose colour when cooked. The young leaves eat like chard and are excellent. Allow about 120 to 150 days from sowing to the first harvest of this variety. The reference colour is red skin and flesh with white and red rings, and that is what tells you it is ready.
