Flowering salsify
The bath might be my favourite place. While it seems half the world submerges in freezing water for spiritual uplift, I crave warm bones, digits like sponge fingers, a little while with an empty brain, and a chapter or two of a good book.
A couple of decades ago, that book was very often Jane Grigson’s Vegetable Book, or her Fruit Book, both of which gave me so many ideas about what to grow and what to do with it in the kitchen. What is a medlar? Are Chinese artichokes any good?
The first year I grew anything, her description of salsify and its dark skinned sister scorzonera had me searching for the then pretty obscure seed. Sown the following spring, they germinated quickly enough but took a long warm season to drive long thin roots into the soil, fattening - as much as they ever do - close to bonfire night, making the newcomer gardener anxious as to whether they’d come to much. I learned that they thrive in a good deep, ideally light soil where the roots can get to 30 or even 40 cm; I also learned that they still taste as good grown in a heavier soil where the root splits like a joke cigar. You have to use a fork to lift and loosen them: pull on the leafy end as you might a carrot, and you’ll end up - as I did - with a stump in your hand and a muddy arse.
In this rainiest of weeks, when two baths a day wouldn’t seem unreasonable, I took The Vegetable Book to the bath again. What a voice Grigson has. Forthright but friendly, definite yet approachable. She oozes authority and her recipes live up to it. I love her economy, assuming the reader has common sense.
She reminds me that the flavoursome but sturdy wild scorzonera was improved by Italian gardeners, a more succulent root the result. It came to the UK unspecifically well before the paler salsify’s arrival 300 years ago. But…‘the odd thing is that neither has ever really caught on, at least with the general public. Intelligent gardeners, from John Evelyn onwards, have always grown either salsify or scorzonera.’
I wonder if - along with the apparent deliciousness - it was that phrase ‘intelligent gardeners’ that was responsible for me first growing it? There’s nothing like a bit of implied flattery to seduce a man who has no idea what he’s doing.
Salsify’s flavour is a mix of artichoke hearts, asparagus and the scent of a distant seashore. You can skin them before boiling but it’s a faff: a fair bit of flesh is lost to the peeler, and they need submerging in acidulated water to prevent discolouring; instead, I simmer the washed roots until al dente and plunge them into cold water, and the skins need only the gentlest persuasion from a dinner knife to slide off.
Happily, the seeds and the roots are more widely available than they were.
Salsify seedhead
One of the things I love most about salsify and scorzonera is that if you don’t get around to harvesting them all, they flower like purple chimney brushes (the first photo) the following year. The seed heads that follow are similarly beautiful. I almost always leave at least a few; once or twice, I’ve even sown a swathe for the flowers and seed alone.
As with salsify and scorzonera, it is bitter leaves’ time of year.
My wife grows radicchio. These deeply purple and green leaved chicories form a semi-tight ball, as if the leaves were half-heartedly papier-mâchéd. I love them for their looks as much as their flavour. Once the seedlings are planted out, life means they are largely left to fend for themselves, and sure enough - as ever - the love they have in those first few weeks is enough to see them through.
A quarter of a century ago, I had no enthusiasm for the bitterness of radicchio, pointed chicory or endive until I look a big, pale, blousy, frilly-as-a-dolly’s-skirt endive and fried it whole in a wok with just a little spitting oil to stop it sticking to the blistering pan. An assault of salt and pepper and a honey mustard dressing had me converted.
Bitter leaves like a little sweetness or the comfort of dairy to sort them out; the French typically throw butter, cream and cheese at salsify, so I hoped a gratin of the two seemed might just work. And it really does.
Salsify and radicchio gratin
This is utterly adaptable to those avoiding dairy or gluten: I used gluten free plain flour, and I’ve used both dairy and their plant-based alternatives and while there’s a difference, both are delicious.