Radishes

[dokutaaguriin]

Hi Ann,
I find the happa daikon to have a wee bit of a bite to them, but nothing too serious. Regular daikon and happa daikon do not have the same hairy leaf as a regular radishes.
We use them two ways: 1. Chopped up in miso shiro (soup).
2. Finely chopped, stir fried with a little sake and carmelized with soya sauce. You could add a little heat to the dish with some hot peppers. A side dish to be eaten with rice.
It seems in some parts of Japan that people simply through away the leaf portion of a daikon radish-such a waste- and are thus quite surprised when we tell them that you can eat them. In addition, most have not heard of happa daikon.
One variety of the top of my head is called hattorikun-from either Sakata or Takii. I don't think they are hybrids so you should beable to save the seed. I will check at hope to see what else I have. I try to harvest the leaves once the root gets to the size of a pencil or so. We also eat the root in miso shiro, too.

[mathfed]

My advice with radishes is to only grow what you think you can personally eat, or stagger the plantings so you don't have a lot being harvested at once. I grew a small section of them a few years ago. They were good. The family was excited to eat them. They ate a few, and decided they had their fill. There were a LOT of radishes left. I ended up taking a baggie of them to work every day to eat as a snack. I haven't grown them since. They are one of those veggies where a little goes a long way, at least for my family. I don't think we have even brought any home from the grocery store since I grew them. If you don't buy them often, you probably won't want to eat handful after handful of them.

[shelleybean]

Mathfed, I have 36 feet of radishes in my garden right now but I can easily eat a dozen at a time, twice a day. I love them with nothing but salt. I keep the Rolaids handy though.

[honu]

Jeff, Thanks for the info and gorgeous photo! I see that Evergreen and Kitazawa Seeds sell the hybrid hattorikun.

Shelley, do you eat them raw or cooked by the dozen? Do you leave the skin on?

[shelleybean]

Raw with the skin on. I have not tried them cooked yet, but I have enough to experiment!

[gardenmaniac]

You will find too, that many of the summer and winter radishes that are not Asian types also do not have prickly leaves. But it really depends on the variety. Some can be quite prickly. We just cook them like turnip green or toss them in with stir fry.

When you have a surplus of radishes then that is when cooking them comes in handy. They become less hot and more potato like so you can blow through a large batch of them quickly when you sautee them as a side dish for a family.

I am with you mathfed- I normally do not eat that many raw. They are good, but eventually enough is enough. Now my 7yo could eat them with salt every day of the year for his lunch and never get tired of them.

The ones at the store always are much hotter than the ones we grow. My 7yo only likes the milder ones so I guess I'll be growing and eating radishes every winter until he moves out of the house . Now my other son (3yo) is obsessed with peas and I do not think any of us could ever get tired of eating them .

Tiffanie

[shelleybean]

Tiffanie, you're so lucky. My kids (ages 4 and 1) are obsessed with French fries and marshmallows.

[spyfferoni]

Two of my kids 8 and 3, love tomatoes---even the yucky ones from the store, although my 8 yr old commented at dinner last night that these tomatoes don't taste as good as the ones we grow. My other son ,6, won't eat tomatoes unless they are yellow or orange. I hope I can get them to try out some radishes. I have grown them before, but planted them late and so they were pretty spicy. I'm hoping this time they'll be milder and my kids will give them a fair shake. I wish they would eat squash. So far I haven't gotten them to eat it unless its hidden in soup or stew, or in baked goods. Kids are funny. They are all so different! Now, back to radishes...

Tyff

[gardenmaniac]

Kids can be so different can't they? Mine refuse to eat raw tomatoes (I really tried to encourage them despite the fact that I do not either). They also won't eat squash or mushrooms unless they are pureed. Amazingly, they will eat cabbage, kholrabi, sweet peppers, carrots, green beans, etc., but ONLY if grown from our garden. They refuse to eat any vegetables from the store claiming they "don't like vegetables". But when questioned about why they eat vegetables from our garden they tell me with a "duh" tone of voice that "our vegetables are different, Mommy." I think it's great that they like our garden vegetables, but it really limits us to seasons since I do not have enough growing space to grow large quantities to freeze and preserve I have gotten them to finally accept frozen peas...

[garnetmoth]

Thanks so much for the neat info! Edible radish greens? Will do!

Are they spicy? do they taste like mustard or turnip greens?

[Andrey_BY]

Originally Posted by gardenmaniac

Tom,

I admit, I just cook them. I cube them and sautee them like the others. They can also be grated over salads. I bet Andrey would know what to do with them. I am getting some seeds from him that he listed in the SSE yearbook.

I have grown as many of the types as we could find seed for. So far, I haven't grown one I didn't like. They are all very different. I sold many at a local growers market and it was amazing how many people came out of the woodwork that grew up eating the various varieties from their homeland.

You are right, sometimes the green/ white ones (the variety I grow is "green meat" from Kitazawa) are very sweet. I guess it depends on how often I decide to water them. You are also correct in that they will bolt quickly. We have a small planting window here in early September and then they grow through the winter. If there is a big cold snap followed by warm temps. they are done for!

Andrey... can you help us???

Tiffanie

Russians (Slavics) have been growing and eating radish for ages. Our classification divides them into 2 types - redis (radish) and red'ka (winter radish, some large summer radishes + daikons).
We've tried a lot of common small size radishes of different colours (red, pink, white, yellow, red/white, pink/white etc.) and grow several daikons (our Gostinets and some Japanese varieties) + winter radishes (black, red, green and white).



Common small sized radish is mostly used in different salads (mized with oil and many other vegetables).

There are many Russian traditional dishes and salads with/from red'ka. The simpliest salad is grated red'ka with carrots and oil or maionesse. Another is from grated red'ka, cheese and garlic + sour cream or grated red'ka, pumpkin, carrot + oil/maionesse.

We also like a traditional Russian soup with kvass and red'ka. It is very fresh and spicy. But you can find kvass (a traditional Russian drink made of bred) only here in CIS unfortunately





http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kvass

I believe most of you know about our traditional soup called borshch. Often we add grated red'ka's roots + cutted in pieces red'ka's greens in borshch along with traditional beets and tomatoes in summer. It is called "summer borshch".

Red'ka is widely used in medicine here. Red'ka with noney mix is a great cure against cough and bronchitum. It is also a good cure against flu - just cut the top of red'ka (we prefer black winter round type) and make a small round hole, then put some honey and cover the top of red'ka with something and leave for a half of day. Then drink this mix and eat the whole red'ka. You will meet next day with 100% health

The easiest way to avoid bitterness from reddish or red'ka is to put them in milk for several hours

And I have to add juice made of red'ka's greens are very good source of sexual potency

[Granny]

Spyfferoni, the absolute hands'-down best trick I know of for getting children to eat their veggies is to simply forbid them to do so, on the grounds that the veggies (or whatever it is they don't like) are only for adults and big people. Be very ostentatious about not putting the offensive item on the plate and make sure you give them a little bit of a hard time when they tell you they are big and should have some.That which is forbidden is the most attractive thing in the world to a kid.

[garnetmoth]

Thanks for the tip Andrey-
Radishes are neat

The only problem is I dont prefer radishes and he loves them... anything I can eat to "catch up"?

[gardenmaniac]

Thanks Andrey! What great information. It's always neat to find out what people from different cultures do with the same vegetable. I am so excited to try out your varieties in the fall/winter.

Granny- LOL I love your post and it is so true! We resort to that tactic sometimes, but our youngest is so stubborn, he won't be led on with those tactics unless he is particularily vulnerable.

Tiffanie

[spyfferoni]

Granny---LOL! I will have to try that. Right now I make my kids, except the 3 yr old, take one bite of what I make for dinner and even give them permission to spit it in the trash---they just have to try it. It is mostly for my 6 yr old who wants a sandwich or cereal for dinner about 50% of the time. Sometimes he'll be reluctant to try something, but after tasting it he'll eat it for dinner. I simply refuse to make a separate meal for him when He won't even attempt to taste what is being offered. There have been a couple of times that he didn't want to try something and went to his room and cried for 30 minutes before giving in. (He can spit in in the trash for crying out loud! I don't make any of my kids eat certain vegetables, I always try to have at least one vegetable I know they will eat, and something else available just in case they feel brave. I've found they will all eat salad if they have the right salad dressing. We all love ranch except my oldest who will only eat salad with Thousand island (because it has ketchup in it and tastes like fry sauce).

Tyff