some herbs I didn’t recognise wandering around the plots .. Kim said the one on the right is tree kale?Thought for 8s

Yes — I’d say Kim is probably close in spirit, but not quite in name.

The plant with the purple/magenta centres on the young leaves looks very much like tree spinach, also called Magentaspreen or Chenopodium giganteum. It is not really kale, though it can be used a bit like spinach/chard in the kitchen.

It is a relative of fat hen / goosefoot, which is why the leaves have that soft, slightly triangular, “weedy spinach” look. The magenta flush in the middle of the young growth is a strong clue.

The big mound in the sack looks like a golden oregano / golden marjoram type herb — possibly Origanum vulgare‘Aureum’ or similar. It has that tight, spreading, yellow-green mat of small opposite leaves. Give a leaf a rub: if it smells warm, savoury and pizza-ish, that confirms it. It may be useful, but it can sprawl.

So, roughly:

First photo: golden oregano / golden marjoram type herb.
Second photo, purple-centred plant: tree spinach / Magentaspreen, not tree kale.
True tree kale: usually looks much more brassica-like, with larger waxier leaves on a woody stem.

Tree spinach is edible, but as with spinach/chard/fat hen, use younger leaves, cook or mix with other greens, and don’t eat enormous quantities raw every day because of oxalates. It may self-seed enthusiastically, so it’s one to enjoy but keep an eye on.

tell me more about goosefoot or fathenThought for a second

Goosefoot is the common name for plants in the Chenopodium group — the name comes from the leaf shape, which often looks a bit like a goose’s foot. Fat hen is the best-known wild one in Britain, and the plant in your photo with the purple centres looks like a close relative: tree spinach / Magentaspreen, sometimes called giant goosefoot.

Fat hen is one of those classic allotment “weeds” that is also a useful edible plant. It often appears in disturbed soil, compost-rich beds, old manure heaps, neglected corners and newly-cleared ground — exactly the kind of place where you’ve been renovating and bringing soil back into use.

What fat hen looks like

Typical fat hen has:

• soft, green, slightly triangular or diamond-shaped leaves
• a mealy or dusty-looking coating on young leaves, especially underneath
• upright stems that can get surprisingly tall if left
• tiny greenish flowers/seeds later in the season
• a very “spinachy weed” look once you recognise it

Your purple-centred plant is showier than ordinary fat hen. Tree spinach / Magentaspreen has that distinctive magenta flush at the growing tips and leaf centres. It can grow tall and impressive, almost like an edible ornamental.

Is it edible?

Yes, many goosefoots are edible, and fat hen has traditionally been eaten as a wild green. The young leaves can be used much like spinach: wilted, steamed, added to soups, omelettes, saag-style dishes, stir-fries or mixed greens.

But I’d treat it as a “use with knowledge” edible, not a casual salad crop. Like spinach, chard and beet leaves, it can contain oxalates, so it is best eaten in moderation and often better cooked than eaten raw in quantity. Also avoid plants from contaminated ground, roadsides, fly-tipped areas or anywhere that may have had chemicals dumped.

Given your garden’s history of neglect and fly-tipping, I’d be a bit cautious about eating self-seeded greens from unknown soil until you are confident the area is clean. On the allotment, in known beds, I’d be more relaxed.

Is it useful on an allotment?

Definitely, depending on your tolerance for volunteers.

It can be:

Useful:
a quick leafy green, wildlife-friendly cover, compost material, and an indicator of fertile disturbed soil.

Annoying:
it can self-seed freely and become a regular visitor in veg beds.

I’d let a few good plants grow where they’re not competing, especially if they are tree spinach, but remove them before they seed unless you want a lot more next year.

Fat hen vs tree spinach vs tree kale

This is where names get muddled.

Fat hen / goosefoot:
wild, green, weedy annual, edible young leaves.

Tree spinach / Magentaspreen:
a cultivated or semi-cultivated goosefoot with bright magenta young growth; edible; can grow tall.

Tree kale:
a perennial brassica, more like cabbage/kale, with larger waxy leaves and woody stems. It is not the same family as goosefoot.

So Kim’s “tree kale” suggestion makes sense in the loose “tall edible leafy thing” sense, but botanically your purple-centred plant looks much more like tree spinach / Magentaspreen.

What I’d do with it

I’d keep one or two handsome plants, take young side shoots for cooked greens, and cut the rest before seed-set. If you like it, you can save seed deliberately from one plant — but do it knowingly, because it may decide to become part of the plot community whether invited or not.

can we confirm this one tooThought for a second

Ah yes — good catch. In that case I wouldn’t make a new post for the red orach / mountain spinach. I’d just use this as a useful cross-reference in the newer “wander round the plots” piece.

Something like:

This also reminded me of the red orach / mountain spinach I wrote about previously — another goosefoot-type plant that behaves like a crop, an ornamental and a self-seeder all at once. Between fat hen, tree spinach and orach, the goosefoot clan seems to be quietly making itself at home around the plots.

Or shorter:

I’ve already written about red orach / mountain spinach, which is another member of this useful-but-enthusiastic goosefoot tribe. Tree spinach seems to belong in the same conversation: edible, attractive, and just a little too good at making itself comfortable.

That way the older post still does the main identification work, and the new one becomes more of a reflective “things noticed while wandering” piece rather than repeating yourself.

yes that is good the shorter versionThought for a second

Yes — use the shorter version. I’d drop it into the new wander-round-the-plots post as a little linking paragraph:

I’ve already written about red orach / mountain spinach, which is another member of this useful-but-enthusiastic goosefoot tribe. Tree spinach seems to belong in the same conversation: edible, attractive, and just a little too good at making itself comfortable.

That keeps the new post from repeating the old one, but still joins the dots nicely.

yes can you finalise this post for me then pleaseThought for a second

Absolutely — here is a finalised WordPress-ready post for From Plot to Pot, using the wander-round-the-plots idea and tying together the tree spinach, golden oregano, red orach reference, polycrub photos, and the gentle website-hinting.

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A Wander Round the Plots: Tree Spinach, Golden Oregano and a Few Quiet Website Hints

Sometimes the best allotment visits are not the ones where you arrive with a rigid job list and a slightly grim determination to get through it.

Sometimes the most useful thing is simply to have a wander.

That was the case today. I took a little time to walk round the plots, chat to a few people, take some photographs, and — very subtly, of course — drop a few hints about the website. There is always something interesting going on around the allotments, and often the best ideas come from peering over a plot edge and asking, “What’s that?”

Tree spinach on Kim’s plot

One of the plants that caught my eye was growing on Kim’s plot: a leafy green plant with striking magenta-purple markings in the centre of the young leaves.

Kim told me it was tree spinach, though by the time I got home I had half-remembered it as tree kale. The mistake turned out to be quite useful, because tree spinach and tree kale are very different things.

Tree kale is a perennial brassica — more like a tall, woody cabbage or kale.

Tree spinach, also known as Magentaspreen, is something else altogether. It belongs with the goosefoots: the same broad group of useful edible plants that includes fat hen, quinoa, spinach, chard and beetroot.

The young leaves can be cooked rather like spinach, and the plant has that slightly magical allotment quality of being part crop, part ornamental, part edible curiosity, and part enthusiastic self-seeder.

I’ve already written about red orach / mountain spinach, which is another member of this useful-but-enthusiastic goosefoot tribe. Tree spinach seems to belong in the same conversation: edible, attractive, and just a little too good at making itself comfortable.

A golden herb in a sack

Elsewhere I spotted another plant I did not immediately recognise: a dense mound of golden-green leaves growing deliberately in one of those allotment sacks.

I do not know whose plot it was on, so I resisted the urge to start investigating too enthusiastically, but it definitely smelled very “herby”. My best guess is golden oregano.

It had the right sort of low, spreading habit, the small yellow-green leaves, and that warm savoury scent that makes you think of Mediterranean cooking. It might possibly have been golden marjoram or something similar, but oregano is the closest match to what I remember.

That was a useful reminder in itself. Not every mystery plant on an allotment is a weed. Some are carefully planted, some are self-seeded, and some sit somewhere between the two. Herbs especially can blur the boundaries: useful in the kitchen, good for pollinators when they flower, and often perfectly happy to spill over the edges of wherever they were first put.

The joy of other people’s plots

One of the real pleasures of a community allotment site is that nobody grows in quite the same way.

Some plots are neat and orderly. Some are experimental. Some are full of fruit bushes, some are full of flowers, some are clearly run by people who understand herbs much better than I do. There are structures, improvised supports, sacks, tubs, old bits of timber, self-seeded volunteers and carefully nurtured treasures.

A wander round the plots is a reminder that gardening knowledge is often passed on sideways: over a bed, beside a compost heap, or during a quick chat while someone is halfway through weeding.

It is also a good way to collect ideas for this website. I do not want From Plot to Pot to pretend to be an official noticeboard or a definitive guide. It is much more personal than that. But the site is partly about noticing what is going on around the allotments, learning from it, and occasionally sharing the useful bits.

A few photographs of the polycrub

I also took some photographs of the polycrub, which deserves a post of its own.

It is one of those allotment structures that manages to be practical, slightly improvised-looking, and rather beautiful in the right light. There is something very satisfying about these working spaces: not glossy show-garden perfection, but real growing infrastructure doing a job.

More on that soon, I hope.

More questions than answers

So today’s wander did not produce a neat list of jobs completed. Instead it produced a few conversations, a couple of plant identifications, some photographs, and a few more things to look up.

That feels very allotment-like.

Tree spinach led back to goosefoots and fat hen. A mystery golden herb turned out, probably, to be golden oregano. Red orach got another mention. The polycrub has been added to the list of things I want to write about properly.

And perhaps most importantly, it was a reminder that the plots are full of stories. You just have to wander slowly enough to notice them.

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Suggested excerpt

A wander round the allotments led to tree spinach on Kim’s plot, a likely golden oregano growing in a sack, a reminder of the useful-but-enthusiastic goosefoot tribe, and a few photographs of the polycrub for a future post.