No-one could have been more suprised than me when I found we have grown some lovely caulis.

I tried them once years ago and got precisely nothing (except leaves), and having read of the difficulty people have in getting good results I gave up. I like cauliflower, but not that much.

The secret(s) of my success are as follows:-

Accept seedlings from neighbour out of politeness

Leave them in the sunniest place in the garden and neglect them for at least three months. Do not pot on, feed, or water adequately.

Wait until most of the leaves have yellowed and dropped off.

Before being totally overcome with guilt, shove them in the allotment, cover with fleece and expect them to die.

Harvest in the New Year, lovely big caulis, no caterpillars, yum.

How lucky was I? Much helped by the mild weather of course. I don' think it will ever happen again!

Anyone else grown anything really well through all the wrong methods?

Not something I grow, especially as they take so much time , plus the local farmer sells stunning collies for 50p..much cheaper to buy them !!!

I think caulis can be one of the most capricious of any veg to grow. Happiness is a well-formed curd, but it's a toss of a coin whether you even get one to form, in my experience. I had some cauliflowers occupy my plot for 14 months before I took the courage to pull them up. I think I had given them quite long enough. But they are indeed so cheap to buy that I no longer bother with them.

That was my point really. Success from doing everything wrong

Dear Pongeroon, that's probably why i'm lucky enough to grow such good Cauliflowers.

I'm still cutting some beauties now.

the few you do get make it all worth while just for the fact that they actually have a flavour

We have no problems growing cauliflowers but can we heck as like grow swedes or turnips!

Ditto on the Swedes Elaine - mine are tall and thin not round and squat. I do get a meal out of them OK but only get these when I don't pamper them - if they get any attention at all they are more the size of baby beets.

Is it the variety or just bad luck

Westi

Hi Westi. I don't know! We've tried a couple of different varieties but had the same result as you. We left it for a couple of years and tried again last year...they germinated well and looked very promising. Then they just seem to stop developing and we get the long efforts as you described. The little white turnips didn't even get that far.
We will just have to keep on accepting a gift from our friends on the next plot....he grows some absolute beauties! (much to my husband's disgust....)

Cheers