Oka Melon (Île Bizard Strain)

High-yielding yellow bush bean. Can withstand comparison with the Beurre de Rocquencourt. Delicious long yellow pods with black seeds. Can be eaten when young and tender or as a dry bean. Very productive over a long period of time, the more you pick the more it will give you beans.

 

This old variety comes from Sainte-Hélène, Kamouraska County, where it has been cultivated since time immemorial by Rollande Labrie (born in 1923) and her family. We are proud to offer it and ensure its preservation.

 

Wax bean originally comes from Algeria. Under the name Algiers Bean, it made its appearance in France in the 1840s. From then on, the French selected and developed many yellow wax beans with black seeds. The most famous one is the Beurre de Rocquencourt, named after a town near Versailles.

Package: 30-35 seeds

Named after the town of Chioggia in the Venetian Lagoon, this beet can be eaten raw or cooked. Delicious sweet taste and a pleasure for the eyes, with its distinctive concentric red and white stripes. Will loose some of its color once cooked, but is perfect for carpaccio. Leaves and stems are edible too.

 

Developed in Italy before 1841, the Chioggia derives from another traditional variety, the Bassano beet, named after a town in the Veneto region. The Chioggia beet was introduced in the United States before 1865 and furthermore perfected by seed producers.

 

As popular as it is easy to grow. Italian Heirloom.

 

Package : 100 seeds.

** CANNOT BE SHIPPED OUT OF CANADA ** The tree onion, or Egyptian onion, has been grown in Quebec for a long time. It is mentioned as early as in the 1820s, and was allegedly brought in with the first colonizers. However its true origin remains mysterious; some people claim that it comes from Catawissa, a town in Pennsylvania, while others say it comes from China. It is a perennial onion that produces, at the tip of its leaves, clusters of red grape-sized bulbils. The most commonly harvested parts are these bulbils and the bulb, but the leaves can also be used, chopped just like chives. After 2 to 3 years, the plant might start feeling a bit crowded at its base: divide the bunch, and transplant individual sections further apart. Extra ones can be eaten like green onions. The tree onion has an elongated bulb that ranges from small to medium in size. Package: About 8 small bulbils per order

Indeterminate. This red currant tomato was discovered in the Châteauguay area in the 1940s. Families and children love its numerous little fruits. The true Petit Moineau bears 7 tiny tomatoes in every cluster. Do not confuse it with an imitator! Package: 40 seeds  

Also known as the "Montreal Market Muskmelon" or "Montreal Nutmeg Melon". This mythical green flesh melon with a nutmeg flavor has almost disappeared.

 

The earliest records come from the Jesuits, who cultivated this variety in the Montreal Plain in 1684. According to the Potager d'Antan : "this melon went through many selections during the 17th Century, before being introduced under the name "Montreal Melon", in 1870. In the 1880s, it was listed as one of the best seller in New England by American seed company Burpee".

 

Very popular at the beginning of the 1900s and until the 1950s, it was largely commercialized and grown by three families : the Aubin, the Décarie and the Gorman. But lack of labour force, rises in wages and the spreading of the city triggered its decline. As highways paved the island, it slowly faded from our collective memory. When farms vanished from Montreal, it risked being obliterated. Until a journalist found its trace in a seed bank, in the United States.

 

This melon is a living proof of our seed and food diversity decline. Save your seeds and share them.

 

Heirloom variety. Listed on Slow Food Canada's Ark of Taste.

 

Pkt : 12 seeds.

Small, oval-shaped cucumbers. Their diameter is only of 2 to 3 cm! They are dark green covered with lighter green stripes, which makes them look like tiny watermelons. Cucamelons taste like cucumbers and lemon. Also called Gerkin cucumbers. Package: 25 seeds.