Home as Your Own Creation

One of the best ways to make the most of a small garden space is to grow vegetables with multiple edible parts. This allows you to harvest the plant at different stages and enjoy roots, greens, flower buds, blossoms, and even seed pods, depending on the crop. One of my very favorite multi-use edibles is ‘Golden Ball’ turnip. I know that the words “favorite” and “turnip” are not typically used in conjunction, but hear me out. I think the reason why people don’t like turnips is because they are often harvested past their prime and then stored for weeks or longer. The roots retain their looks in storage, but they develop a much stronger flavor.

Small turnips, harvested at the size of a fat radish, are very sweet. You can seriously pull them out of the garden, rinse them off with the hose, and pop them right into your mouth. They are even better boiled and mashed with butter and caramelized onions. Even if you never warm up to the roots, the greens are phenomenal.

The greens have a very mild mustard flavor and a tender texture when harvested very small (just 2 to 3 inches long) and they can be added to salads at the stage. As the greens mature, they develop a stronger flavor and also a velcro-like texture (not unlike radish greens). At this point, the greens really aren’t very tasty raw, but they completely transform when cooked. The little prickles on the leaves disappear and heat tempers the mustard flavor. I like to stir-fry or braise the leaves with garlic and then stuff them into tacos or quesadillas. To harvest the greens, just cut off the outer layer of leaves as the plants grow (new leaves will emerge from the center). If you don’t want to harvest the roots, you can also grasp all the leaves from a single plant in one hand and cut them down two inches above the root for a cut-and-come again harvest.

‘Golden Ball’ has very pale yellow skin, exceptionally sweet roots, and productive tops. I planted mine in late spring and we are still harvesting the roots and greens. The plants are beginning to show signs of bolting, which is just fine with me. Turnips and broccoli rabe are very closely related botanically speaking, and turnip flower buds taste amazing in stir fry. Once I harvest the buds, I’ll pull up the remaining big roots and feed them to my chickens, who have never met a root vegetable they didn’t like.

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