gGrazing through Rob Young’s greenhouses is the sort of experience that leaves you with a radical reconsideration of salad. Yes, salad.

There is the Japanese red mustard that tastes like wasabi, the sugar snap pea greens that taste just like sugar snap peas. There is a red sorrel with a tart lemony flavor and a pepper cress that is quite peppery. There is red Russian kale and tat soy and bok choy and purple kohlrabi and upland cress and spinach, too. When you’re in Young’s greenhouse eating the greens, you just pull them out of their beds, shake o the dirt and eat. And it is sublime— who knew salad could taste like this?

Young sells washed, mixed bags of these greens at farmers markets around the D.C. area. People taste the mixes and ask what’s in them.

“I list o 15 things,” Young says. “All that’s in there. It tastes so good.”

Young grows greens and micro-greens, which are, as the name suggests, very small greens, mostly used as garnish. He grows these plants in t wo greenhouses he built using mostly recycled materials, just feet from the door of the refurbished Quonset hut he lives in with his wife, Annie, a teacher. The Youngs live on the property of a long-standing intentional community, the Claymont Society for Continuous Education. The land was developed by George Washington’s nephew, and the society now hosts seminars and retreats in Charles Town, W. Va., a bit more than an hour’s drive from Washington, D.C.

 

A bevy of fresh produce from Patowmack Farm.

Growing Green

Young’s been growing his greens for about seven years—with a partner for the first five years, and on his own for the past t wo. He has been experimenting with di erent plants and growing methods, finding natural ways to repel pests and keep his plants’ lives stress-free. It makes for a spectacularly delicious salad.

And because of the deliciousness, business is picking up. Farmers market customers like his stu ; he’s a handsome guy handing out samples of fabulously tasty greens, so it’s hard to resist. And restaurants around D.C. are buying as