As I started gardening a few years ago, I didn’t really know what I was doing. One day in late spring (or early summer), I bought several herb and vegetable plants on sale from the local home and garden store. “What wonderous luck!” I thought, “Everything’s on sale!” Seasoned gardeners know why: most (all?) plants prefer certain growing conditions. Tomatoes: hot. Spinach: cool. Blueberries: acidic soil. And the plants need ample time to grow. These plants were on sale because… well… because it was probably too late in the season to plant them.
In my excitement (and plant ignorance), I bought tomatoes, peppers, basil, thyme, bee balm, and cilantro. The tomatoes grew well enough. I picked about three peppers. The basil grew; the thyme continues to grow (it’s a perennial); the bee balm tried to take over my garden the next two growing seasons (also perennial); and the cilantro… well, the cilantro bolted. But I didn’t know this at first. A church friend came over to admire my garden and I proudly pointed to my cilantro.
“Oh, that looks about done,” he said.
I just planted it last week, I thought.
My friend explained that when the plant gets “leggy” or grows up and spindly really fast without producing many leaves, that means it’s bolted and is bitter-tasting. Well, poop. I wonder if [insert local home and garden store] will refund my money?
Since then, I’ve learned a lot about cilantro and have seen its full life-cycle. Here it is:
Seeds:
At first the sprouts will only have their two sprout leaves, but when the third and fourth leaves emerge, you can see cilantro’s recognizable leaves.
Here’s a healthy little cilantro plant. Harvest a few leaves from each plant to “cut and come again” or harvest whole plants stems and all. Note: this plant is right next to a sprawling oregano..
Cilantro bolts when the weather warms up and/or the soil temperature raises above about 75 degrees (Farenheit). When it bolts, you’ll see it grow straight up very quickly and produce fewer leaves. It will also taste less cilantro-y and more bitter.
To keep cilantro from bolting, give it shade or part-shade towards the hotter part of the summer. Sometimes my cilantro will last a little longer if I cut the bolting stems down. I planted some seeds late in season this year but nearly under a large oregano plant (in the picture above). These plants lasted longer than the cilantro in sunnier spots. My friend, Bree, even planted some in a nearly full-shade area in the middle of summer. They sprouted and didn’t bolt for quite some time!
As cilantro continues its life-cycle, it flowers in full-force and grows about two and half feet up and out.
It can take over a large part of your garden–or walkway. See it there in the middle between the fence and raised bed? Yeah, I also have a lot of weeds.
The flowers get pollinated and turn to green seeds.
When the plants dry, the seeds are brown and ready to harvest.
When the plant gets a little dryer, I usually pull out the whole thing and hang it from my fence on a hot day to let it finish drying out. Then I collect the seeds (usually some stemmy parts get mixed in) and let them sit out in an open paper bag or on a cookie sheet to ensure they’re completely dry, then I store them in a ziplock bag in the cabinet or fridge. As long as they stay cool and dry, they should last a few years. The seeds can be replanted, shared, or used as-is: coriander!
And we are back where we started. Seeds!
A few words of caution: cilantro in seed will plant itself indeed! Seeds become plants even if (especially if) they overwinter. I had more cilantro than I knew what to do with the first year after I let the plants run their full life-cycle… but the plants DO smell good when crushed underfoot.
So, what do we do with all this cilantro?
I’ve used it in fresh salsa. Other ideas?
Unperfect Garden 