T
he first vegetable I ever
grew was a radish. In my
childhood garden we
already had silverbeet,
peas and asparagus. I don’t know
why it was decided one spring that
I should grow radishes – none of
us liked them. It was the ’80s, and
our salad repertoire consisted of
tinned pineapple and beetroot,
a mayonnaisey pasta salad and
iceberg lettuce. Spicy things were
something exotic to eat as a dare,
but in a concrete-bound triangle
between the paths to the shed and
the compost heap, I sowed my
seeds and they grew. I have visions
of pretty red baubles, but I can’t
remember eating them.
Fast-forward 30 years and I’m
hooked. I began in our market
garden with Scarlet Globe and
French Breakfast. They grew fast,
tasted great and sold like hotcakes.
Not one to rest on a winner,
I looked further and found a great
option for the seed explorer: the
mixed packet. The results lived up
to expectations, and Easter Egg
was irresistible.Harvesting root vegetables always
feels miraculous. An unpromising
patch of soil, covered in green
foliage, becomes a different thing
entirely when seen from a snail’s-
eye view where you glimpse a little
of what’s hiding under the earth.
Radishes grow up as well as down,
and push their shoulders proud of
the surface. Some, like the savoury,
meaty Pink Beauty, are shy and
remain demurely covered, but
daikon leap from the earth like
breaching whales.
When we harvested the first
Easter Eggs it was indeed like
an Easter egg hunt, every root a
different shade of red, pink, white
or purple. The contrast of those
impossibly bright colours against
the brown earth is a delight to
behold, and the delight continues
as you rinse the clinging soil
from the roots. In the best of
circumstances, you find yourself
seated in a favourite restaurant
watching a chef scrape the last of
the fine roots from each radish and
presenting them to you on a plate
with cultured butter and salt.Those nifty chefs manage other
miracles, too. Until I began working
with chefs I’d never dreamed of
cooking a radish. Cut in half to
allow contact with the pan, they
can be fried quickly in butter and
they lose their pepperiness and
caramelise a little, taking on a
savoury-sweet succulence.
There are radish varieties bred
for non-hairy leaves, others for
punchy “rat-tailed” pods. Radish
flowers are among the tastiest of
the edible blooms, and they come
in all shades – pink, yellow and
white, with fascinating venation in
the petals. The stems are juicy and
the buds peppery – the entire plant
is worthy of culinary attention.
After exploring the salad
varieties, I delved into bigger ones.
Traditionally grown as staples for
pickles, fermenting or cellaring,
winter radishes beg a little more
attention. Sure, pretty winter
radishes such as Watermelon with
its pink heart, or Oriental Green
with its lurid chlorophyll-coloured
centre are beautiful shaved and
dressed as a simple salad, but one
of the most delicious radish dishes
I’ve tasted was daikon cake given to
me with instructions to slice it and
fry it until crisp. After dodging hot
gobs of flying oil I bit through the
crunchy outside to the almost
gelatinous interior dotted with
chunks of lap cheong – surely an
effort to prepare, but wonderful
enough to be worthy of labour.
The pinnacle for the hardcore
radish explorer is the black-skinned
varieties. Fiery and dense, they’re
bred for storage and used in winter
salads when fresh vegetables are
scarce. I’ve eaten black radish
roasted in a wood oven, wonderful
and succulent after long, slow
cooking, and had them grated raw
as a horseradish-like condiment.
While doing my research
I found there’s a species of radish
with seed that makes an excellent
substitute for mustard. I now
wonder where can I get my hands
on some seed.●“Some
radishes,
like Pink
Beauty, are
shy and
remain
demurely
covered, but
daikon leap
from the
earth like
breaching
whales.”Root
cause
The standout performance
of radishes in the garden
is only the beginning
of their appeal, writes
PAULETTE WHITNEY.
52 GOURMET TRAVELLERILLUSTRATIONS DAWN TAN & LAUREN HAIRE (PORTRAIT)Produce