The UK brassica market at the moment is proving to be hard work, although prices are not increasing that much, it is difficult to get the quality. This is a direct consequence of the recent record temperatures a couple of weeks ago.
"The broccoli price is on the rise but not by a huge amount," explains a trader from the New Covent Garden wholesale market. "It is hard to get good quality, cauliflower prices are stable but the problem there is that its difficult to get really nice white heads which is putting the buyers off. On the bright side romanesc is great, just completely in contrast to the other British veg."
"Normally people will go from cauliflower to broccoli or vice versa when it is like this, so just now they might change to leeks, courgettes or carrots for example, but during the English season it never really gets out of hand in relation to what people have on fixed pricing."
Only English broccoli is on the market just now and this will remain the case unless it get ridiculously expensive, according to the trader. "Then there might be some import from France. Spanish is finished and Italian is not good at this time of year, even the French wouldn't be that great but would be value for money. But we will stay with English, and I don't expect it to get too out of hand as it not really a summer vegetable anyway."
