Hi, This is way off topic but I can't find anybody to ask other than the nice people in this group. What can you tell me about growing banana plants? I love to eat bananas but I have not had much luck growing them. I have tried to grow the corms, the bush and the trees. Please help me. I would like to eat some home grown bananas before my time is up. I haven't been writing to the group because of illness but I try to read and learn scamp@earthlink.net Thanks, Chris Council -----Original Message----- From: pbs-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:pbs-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Jane McGary Sent: Tuesday, February 10, 2009 6:55 PM To: Pacific Bulb Society Subject: Re: [pbs] culinary muscari - on topic Diane wrote, At 11:52 AM 2/10/2009, you wrote: >Yesterday I was served some "balsamic onions" which were muscari >bulbs. They tasted good. > >They are from Italy, called cipollini, and are Muscari comosum. >Cornucopia II says that M. comosum is really Leopoldia comosa, tassel >hyacinth, and that it is also eaten in Greece. Wild bulbs are >preferred to cultivated ones. I'm not growing that one. Cipolline are not muscari bulbs, they are a variety of the cultivated onion (Allium). They are now increasingly seen in supermarkets here and starts can be purchased from Territorial Seed. They are small and very flattened in shape. They are tasty and rather hard to prepare because the stem tends to go all through the center and you have to cut it loose. The "balsamic" in the dish described probably was the vinegar used in the preparation. Muscari comosum is eaten in Greece and I have tried it, but it was too bitter for me, even though they leach out some of the compounds in preparing it. Leopoldia is an older synonym for the "tassel" muscari species; it has been sunk in Muscari now. Jane McGary _______________________________________________ pbs mailing list pbs@lists.ibiblio.org http://www.pacificbulbsociety.org/list.php http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/