I like the idea of exotic plants growing in the Great White North, where such plants have no business growing. I came across an article on culantro. Early in Spring I gave myself the task of growing culantro (not cilantro), an herb that is used in cooking throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. Cilantro comes from the Mediterranean while culantro is native to the Americas. They have a similar flavour profile but culantro is much bigger plant that grows up to a foot a long with long broad leaves. One can cook culantro in the heat without loss of flavor.
The culantro seeds are tiny, and the package came with a great many of them. The instructions were basically to throw a bunch in the soil and good luck. I did as instructed and had no luck. I was about to give up, when I decided to use a small pot and to my surprise, a couple of seeds germinated. Eventually one of the plants died but the other lived on. It has been slow going. After about 7 months, the plant is barely two centimeters. Nevertheless, it's still hanging on.
Now that the weather has gotten cold and dreary, there's less warmth and sunlight. I've moved the plant to a new self-watering pot and placed it under some grow lights. It appears to be happy there, so maybe, just maybe, it will reach its full potential.
I don't know how many people in Canada are growing culantro in a downtown condo, but this little guy might just be one of a kind.
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