Iceberg LettucePosted 10 years ago under Uncategorized
Iceberg lettuce is a lettuce that resembles cabbage but with a bland taste and only a tiny fraction of the nutrition that can be found in cabbage. For nearly a hundred years iceberg lettuce has remained the most popular lettuce in the US. It is still the most commonly eaten lettuce by Americans, but its’ popularity has been waning since the 1970s. It is inexpensive, and keeps better than most lettuces do. It is however, almost completely bereft of any significant nutritional value. Iceberg lettuce is grown for its’ leaves, typically used in salads.
James Beard was fond of iceberg lettuce saying, “Many people damn it, but it adds good flavor and a wonderfully crisp texture to a salad.” (“It also keeps longer than other lettuces,” )
Up until the 1930s iceberg lettuce was known as crisphead lettuce. However this was imprecise because iceberg lettuce was only one of many different varieties of crisphead lettuce. Other examples of crisphead lettuce are imperial lettuce, great lakes lettuce, vanguard lettuce and western lettuce.
The term iceberg lettuce became adopted due to the lettuces’ suitability for cold transport. A company called Fresh Express would package the lettuce with ice to ship it from California to cities in demand along the east coast. Back then it was a big deal to receive fresh produce in the winter. The crowds would loudly exclaim “the icebergs are coming! The icebergs are coming!” and the name stuck.
Commercial Production: California is the leading producer of iceberg lettuce in the United States.
Growing Conditions: Iceberg lettuce prefers an alkaline soil with a PH of 7.0 to 7.5.
Diseases
Anthracnose (microdochium panattonianum), Bottom rot, downy mildew, (bremia lactucae) leaf drop (sclerotininia sclerotiorum), powdery mildew (erysiphe cichoracearum), and septoria leaf spot (septoria lactucae), are all caused by fungal infections . The Virus that is the most common to iceberg lettuce cultivation is known as big vein. Big Vein is transmitted via the help of a fungus olpidium brassicae.
Pests
Iceberg lettuce is often preyed upon by slugs and snails. More specifically, the grey garden slug, spotted garden slug, brown garden snail, and the European garden snail.
Sources:
https://www.plantvillage.com/en/topics/lettuce/infos/diseases_and_pests_description_uses_propagation
http://kitchenproject.com/history/Salads_Lettuce/IceburgLettuce.htm