Hungarian Bread Poppy

This annual poppy is the variety grown for the poppy seeds used in breads and cakes. Highly nutritious, extremely productive, and easy to harvest–you’ll be surprised at your yields. Or you may just want to grow them for beauty’s sake. Five-foot-tall plants offer up many 3-inch papery blooms that are a favorite of bumblebees. Even the dry seedheads are attractive, and the plants will re-seed dependably. You’ll only need to buy seed once.

Culture: Start in late winter or early spring; they can tolerate mild frosts.

Saving seed: Bread poppies need at least a month after flowering to ripen. After the petals fall away, the little “space station” pods remain. When the arched windows ringing the pods open, the seeds are ready. Clip off the opened pods into a paper bag. Every day for a week or so, they’ll reward you with lots of seed (we harvested three pounds from 120 square feet).

Grown in 2011
Packet = around 1,000 seeds - $3.