Trial: Annual

Year Trialed: 2009

Good Qualities

Wonderful basil fragrance (4); Much stronger plant than Basil ‘Oriental Breeze’, did not break off or split as much as ‘Oriental Breeze’, it was about 2.5 to 3 weeks later to bloom than ‘Oriental Breeze’; Would be very nice in a bouquet, unique flower unlike any other; None that I can see; Excellent stem length, good color contrast of blooms, vigorous; Forms a nice dark purple head, didn’t catch downy mildew like the rest of our basil; Everyone like the color and texture it added to bouquets, some even liked it alone, it lasted well and added a lot of dimension; Beautiful purple stems and large flowers; Beautiful blooms, unusual, even held up in the cooler below 50 degrees; Very unusual flower but with the good basil smell; Very desirable, good plant size and quantity, quality and depth of color in the darker tip growth; Thicker leaves than other basils, used as a filler.

Problems

None (2); Took too long to flower (2); I planted too close together and both tended to lodge and be so tightly packed together that the plants were not done justice, this was my first time growing ornamental basil, I thought there would be taller spikes with many bracts but instead the terminals were sort of short and flat for both ‘Oriental Breeze’ and ‘Cardinal’; I did not know where to cut them. Basil ‘Cardinal’ was very late to show any color, the leaves reminded me of spinach because of their rounded edges, I much prefer ‘Oriental Breeze’ and so did my customers; Leaves cup, side shoots need to be removed or else flower spikes hidden; Flower heads were much to chunky and large, next time I will pinch and hope it helps produce more useable stems; We put this into the field too late to get any sizable stems; As with most basils, I wish they would grow just a little taller; Hit by frost on Sept. 19, just at the time the top leaves were developing crimson; I don’t know how this is used as a cut, the green leaves wilted out easily, it was short and bushy – I made pesto out of it.

Similar Cultivars

‘Oriental Breeze’ (2); No!; Reminded me of a Celosia.

Comments

Nice to have certified organic seed, high tunnel; No Japanese beetles! after 5 days in the vase it lost its color, looked brown, might be nice as a dried flower; Prefer blooms that spike more; Wish stems were longer but did have usable stems, customers liked the subtle fragrance in bouquets; Sold ‘Oriental Breeze’ a number of years ago, but stopped due to lack of sales, we see ‘Cardinal’ as having more potential in the microgreens market; Harvested August week 2 to 3 (planted in field 6/10, Zone 5); My new favorite basil; My customers loved this one, even customers that never buy cinnamon basil bought this one, they loved how it looked, we will be adding this one to our mix next season; we pulled whole plants as base bouquet filler; Perhaps it is too cold here (Zone 5).

Postharvest

Cut early in the day as they seemed to wilt and then come back, kept cool and if stems were woody, I would slit the bottom, also used Floralife; We cut it, got it out of the sun immediately and then re-cut it and put it in hot floral preservative and in a cooler at 50 degrees, not too cold; Seemed to hold better with overnight conditioning in water.

See separate postharvest report for results from NC State University postharvest evaluations.

Trial Data

Supplier

Genesis Seeds
Ashalim, Israel