I've been reviewing last season as I plan 2024 and I love to look at some of my favorite new-to-me veggies of the year. Three in particular come to mind:
Rat’s Tail Radish
First, we have rat's tail radishes. These are actually a radish where you eat the seed pod rather than the root. Obviously... they look kind of like a rat's tail. The pods were prolific on even a single plant and taste deliciously spicy. You can snack on them or use them fresh on salads, soups or tacos. I imagine they’d be delicious as a veggie to dip in hummus as well!
They are super easy to grow and quite tolerant of heat, unlike their rooted family members. Hailing from Southern Asia, they came to English gardens via Java in 1815. You’ll find them in Indian and other Asian cuisine. They are also a wonderful addition to your garden for attracting pollinators who love their flowers.
My friend, Chef Jessica Arends pickled a bunch of them to use on a fall seasonal salad at the dinner we collaborated on with Patina 250 this november. You can also toss them into a stir-fry right towards the end of cooking to add a spicy bite to your meal!
Yu Choy / Yu Choy Sum
Second, I utterly fell in love with Yu Choy or Yu Choy Sum. This is a leafy green chinese vegetable in the brassica family close to bok choy or chinese broccoli. It looks a lot like Chinese Broccoli, or Gai Lan, but is much sweeter and tenderer like a good bok choy.
Somewhere in my research, I learned that for some people, Yu Choy is the name without flowers and Yu Choy Sum is with the flowers (which are edible). However, often you’ll see these names interchanged. Here’s a great website with harvest and cooking tips.
These beautiful greens were extremely easy to grow, seemed rather pest resistant, particularly to flea beetles, and flourished all the way into light snow while staying tender and sweet. They’re certainly a fall and winter green that I’ll keep around!
Too prepare them is simple: a quick blanch and a drizzle of chili oil with garlic or your favorite sauce. I like to use sesame oil, smoked salt and toasted sesame seeds. They were incredibly delicious— perfectly tender and sweet. I was also able to get multiple harvests from the sideshoots. You will absolutely see these on my farm again!
Controne Beans
Finally, if you've followed me a bit, you know I've had a love affair with the Controne beans. These beans are a tender bean from Controne, Italy in the Campania region of Italy (around Napoli). They are a lush pole bean from this region that are known to have a thin skin, making them easier to cook (no pre-soak) and thus digest. The produced an absolutely prolific amount of pods growing them on an arched trellis.
We unintentionally had a small harvest of them as fresh young pods and they proved to be incredibly delicious! I lightly steamed the pods with a bit of a mustard vinaigrette sauce on them. You could blanch them also, I’d only do a minute or less. However, I grew the majority of them all the way to dried beans. They were easy to husk with a large number of beans per pod.
Dried, these beans look like little pearls - round and white. I gave jars of them as holiday gifts to my friends and family this season combined with homemade herbs for an easy bean recipe.
I'm sure that all three of these vegetables: Rat’s Tail Radish, Yu Choy & Controne beans will appear again on my farm. And… I can't wait to explore what new things I'll try in 2024 (I’ve got a few ideas in mind)
What are you excited to try growing, cooking or tasting from your garden this year?