Belgian leeks are like the Rolls-Royce among leeks
On a freezing Friday morning, we stand in Jurgen De Roo’s field, a second-generation leek farmer. The cold doesn't seem to bother him. Passionately and with expertise, he tells us about his craft. "Growing leeks is a challenge. It's the first thought I have when I wake up and the last before I go to bed. But I wouldn't want it any other way." Father Mark De Roo first had a pig farm and he then started growing cauliflowers in the early 1980s. Twenty years later, his son Jurgen runs the family business. He grows early leeks as well as summer, autumn and winter leeks.
"It is crucial to harvest at the right time," Jurgen explains. "If you wait two or three weeks too long, the quality deteriorates.” “Growing leeks is really challenging work.” Belgian leeks have a number of special features, e.g. a straight shape or the white part of the leek is at least 15 centimetres. The vegetable also looks highly attractive with shiny dark green leaves, protecting the edible part of the leek. “You only get this result thanks to optimal quality care, strict sorting and refrigeration immediately after harvest,” Jurgen says. As a grower, you don’t know in advance whether you will really succeed in achieving the strict quality standards.
And yet Jurgen is gleaming on his field. “I really grew up in it. As a seven-year-old boy, I was already helping. I just really enjoy doing it. Being able to make your own decisions, being outside all day, watching the leek plants grow — I get up with it and go to bed with it, and I wouldn’t want it any other way.” As his job has not been getting any easier, with climate becoming more and more extreme, with heat waves, droughts and excessive rain ... Jurgen tells us that he cannot use his own machines to harvest because the leek fields are too wet. “I now hire contractors with better equipped machines. Next year, I need to adapt my own machines so that they can cope with extremely wet periods better.”
Jurgen is trying hard to maintain product and soil quality. “We are also only allowed to use a very limited number of crop protection products. Fortunately, we can overcome this by choosing specific leek varieties that are more resistant and naturally more disease resistant.” He also reuses rinse water while cleaning the harvested leeks and produces green electricity with solar panels. “Leek is not only a sustainable crop, it also comes with challenges. But it is satisfying to deliver Belgian-worthy top quality every day.”