Spinach

Spinach (Spinacia oleracea), a hardy annual, probably native to Western Asia, belonging to the order Chenopodiaceae, which has been cultivated in England for more than three centuries for the sake of its large, succulent, triangular leaves, which form an esteemed vegetable. They are rich in nitre. Tetragonia expansa, the New Zealand Spinach, wild in Japan and in most of the southern hemisphere, was introduced by Banks in 1772, and is used as a summer spinach. The leaves of some small varieties of beet (Beta vulgaris) are also employed as a substitute, and the young tops of the stinging nettle are similar in flavour. Mountain Spinach or orache (Atriplex hortensis), a native of Tartary, formerly much grown in England, is still cu1tivated in France.