Valerianella locusta
| Corn salad, mâche, lamb's lettuce |
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| Corn salad is identifiable by its rounded leaf and deep green color | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| (unranked): | Angiosperms |
| (unranked): | Eudicots |
| (unranked): | Asterids |
| Order: | Dipsacales |
| Family: | Caprifoliaceae |
| Genus: | Valerianella |
| Species: | V. locusta |
| Binomial name | |
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Valerianella locusta (L.) Betcke |
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| Synonyms | |
| Nutritional value per 100 g (3.5 oz) | |
|---|---|
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3.6 g
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0.4 g
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2 g
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| Minerals | |
| Sodium |
(0%)
4 mg |
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| Percentages are roughly approximated using US recommendations for adults. Source: |
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Valerianella locusta is a small annual plant that is eaten as a leaf vegetable. It has a characteristic nutty flavor, dark green color, and soft texture, and is popularly served as salad greens. Common names include corn salad,common cornsalad,lamb's lettuce,mâche (/mɑːʃ/), fetticus,feldsalat,nut lettuce,field salad, and rapunzel. In restaurants that feature French cooking, it may be called doucette or raiponce, as an alternative to mâche, by which it is best known. In German-speaking Switzerland it is known as Nüsslisalat or Nüssler, terms that have been borrowed by the area's many English-speakers.
Corn salad grows in a low rosette with spatulate leaves up to 15.2 cm long. It is a hardy plant that grows to zone 5, and in mild climates it is grown as a winter green.
In warm conditions it tends to bolt to seed, producing much-branched stems with clusters (cymes) of flowers. The flowers have a bluish-white corolla of five fused petals, 1.5 to 2 mm (0.06 to 0.08 in) long and wide, and three stamens. Underneath the flowers is a whorl of bracts. Fertilized flowers produce achenes with 2 sterile chambers and one fertile chamber.
Corn salad grows wild in parts of Europe, northern Africa and western Asia. In Europe and Asia it is a common weed in cultivated land and waste spaces. In North America it has escaped cultivation and become naturalized on both the eastern and western seaboards.
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Wikipedia