Last edited on November 29, 2025. View history
Endive
How to sow endive: Direct seed indoors, transplant outside after hardening off seedlings
Sun requirement for endive: Plant in Full Sun
Curly Endive is a narrow-leaved member of the Chicory family (versus Escarole, which is broad-leaved). It grows in loose heads of narrow, green, lacey leaves with curled tips. The head is often tied together when it is 25cm tall to blanch the inner leaves. The outer leaves have a slightly bitter flavor, and the inner leaves have a subtle sweetness and more delicate texture. All of the leaves sweeten slightly with frost or cooking. Curly Endive can be eaten raw in salads or cooked in soups, stews, and other dishes.
A plant grows with warmth, not with days. A growing degree day is one day's worth of useful warmth: how many degrees the day's average temperature is above the lowest temperature the crop grows at. Add them up from planting and you know how far along the crop is, whatever the calendar says.
Say that lowest temperature is 10ยฐC. A day averaging 17ยฐC gives 7 growing degree days. A day averaging 8ยฐC gives none, as it is too cold for the crop to grow. That is why the same lettuce takes about 50 days in a summer and 90 in an autumn: it needs the same total warmth either way.
For endive, the FAO EcoCrop database gives a lowest growing temperature of 5ยฐC and a shortest growing cycle of 70 days at its best temperature, about 980 growing degree days to a first harvest.
Where you've told us where your garden is, we use this and the weather there to predict when your endive will be ready to harvest. We don't use it for how long a plant lives or when it finishes: we go by what members have logged for that.
Only plantings by members who have set their locations are shown.
by Skud,
Just a note of something edible I planted, that won't ever be in our crops database, and would be a prime candidate for the "other" option we've talked about implementing: I just planted a big wide container with Diggers Club "Microgreen Winter Mix" which contains red โฆ
kale
tatsoi
endives
If sown now, expect a first harvest in about 70 to 85 days.
From the growing cycle in the FAO EcoCrop database, which is the same wherever it is grown.
Data from the FAO EcoCrop database for Cichorium endivia L.
| Family / Taxonomy | Magnoliopsida Asteridae Asterales Compositae |
|---|---|
| Killing temperature | growth: -1 ยฐC, rest: -5 ยฐC |
| Life form | herb |
| Life span | annual, biennial |
| Habit | acaulescent (or rosette plants) |
| Optimal soil depth | shallow (20-50 cm) |
| Optimal soil texture | medium, organic |
| Optimal soil fertility | high |
| Optimal soil drainage | well (dry spells) |
| Optimal soil salinity | low (<4 dS/m) |
| Photoperiod | short day (<12 hours), neutral day (12-14 hours), long day (>14 hours) |
Resources outside Growstuff.
Photos
tatsoi
shiny harvested 4.
View all endive seeds