Lamb’s lettuce or corn salad is a leafy green vegetable with a nutty flavour, commonly cultivated in France but less commonly found in shops. In the wild it grows as a weed of cereal crops thus the name corn salad.
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Lamb’s lettuce
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Lamb’s lettuce
| Hedgerow Type | |
| Common Names | Lamb’s Lettuce, Corn Salad, Field Salad, Nut Lettuce, Common Corn Salad |
| Scientific Name | Valerianella locusta |
| Season Start | Jan |
| Season End | Jan |
Please note that each and every hedgerow item you come across may vary in appearance to these photos.
Leaves
Shiny green lanceolate to obovate leaves growing in a basal rosette. They appear rolled when first emerging but soon flatten out.
Flowers
Has five tiny white to very pale mauve or pale blue petals fused together at the base with three stamen and a three lobed stigma. It usually flowers from March to June.
Stem
Green and hollow with ridges, the ridges having very small hairs.
Habitat
Waste ground, gardens, roadsides and disturbed soil.
Taste
Pleasant and nutty.
Frequency
More common in towns than the countryside. Lambs Lettuce is fairly common but can be hard to differentiate from other wayside weeds.
Other Facts
It is supposedly called Corn Salad as it used to grow with corn in fields but doesn’t appear to do so nowadays.
Lamb’s Lettuce refers to the leaves similarity with lambs tongues.
