Sea Beet is the wild ancestor of common Vegetables on a market Vegetable is a nutritional and culinary term denoting any part of a plant that is commonly consumed by humans as food, but is not regarded as a culinary fruit, nut, herb, spice, or grain. In common usage, vegetables include the leaves (e.g. lettuce), stems (asparagus...
vegetables such as A beet (called beetroot in the United Kingdom and its former colonies, as well as table beet, garden beet, blood turnip or red beet) is a plant of the genus often refers to the thick, red, fleshy taproots of such plants, some of which are eaten as root vegetables, and...
beetroot, Two sugar beets - the one on the left has been cultivated to be smoother than the traditional beet, so that it traps less soil. Sugar beet . Discovery Beets (and carrots) were identified as potential sources of sugar by the Prussian chemist Andreas Sigismund Marggraf in 1747, but he thought that...
sugar beet and Trinomial name Chard (or Swiss Chard), , also known as silverbeet or perpetual spinach is a leaf vegetable, and is one of the cultivated descendents of the Sea Beet, . While used for its leaves, it is in the same species as the garden beets, which are used for their roots, including...
swiss chard. Its leaves have a pleasant texture and taste when served raw or cooked.
It is a maritime plant able to tolerate relatively high levels of sodium in its environment.
The origin of seabeet populations of the Baltic Sea coast of Germany was investigated by collecting seed samples and performing comparative RAPD-PCR analyses.
The genetic analysis shows a close relationship of German seabeets to Danish seabeet populations, which suggests that the beets of the German Baltic sea coasts are pure wild beets (1) but not weed beets (2) or hybrids (3).
The examination of German Baltic seabeet populations is of particular concern for competent authorities for the regulation of transgenic organisms (GMO) due to the close proximity of wild beet to sugar beet fields.
This white-rooted Beet is also cultivated for its leaves, which are put into soups, or used as spinach, and in France are often mixed with sorrel, to lessen its acidity.
In its uncultivated form, the root of the SeaBeet is coarse and unfit for food, nor has any use been made of the plant medicinally, but the Garden Beet has been cultivated from very remote times as a salad plant and for general use as a vegetable.