Stir up Sunday

Stir up Sunday

Watercress - The Original Superfood

Watercress - The Original Superfood

The first British watercress farm was started in Kent in 1808 and with the advent of a national railway system soon after this, tons of the stuff was transported daily to London to be sold at Covent Garden Market.  Street sellers bundled it into bunches to be eaten on the go and watercress sandwiches were popular both for breakfast and at tea time.

Watercress is cultivated in shallow gravel beds and needs a constant supply of clean, mineral-rich water in which to grow.  The majority of British-grown watercress now comes from Hampshire and Dorset where the abundant chalk streams provide the perfect environment for the farms.

Containing gram for gram, more vitamin C than oranges, more calcium than milk and more iron than spinach, it’s no wonder that watercress has been used for thousands of years to cure all sorts of ills and to prevent others.  The Greek father of medicine, Hipprocrates, was said to have located his first hospital beside a stream so that he could grow plenty of fresh watercress to treat his patients; the Romans and Anglo-Saxons ate it to prevent baldness and it is also said to be a good cure for a hangover.  All reasons enough to eat our fill of this water-grown superfood.

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