Icon - Arrow LeftAn icon we use to indicate a rightwards action. Icon - Arrow RightAn icon we use to indicate a leftwards action. Icon - External LinkAn icon we use to indicate a button link is external. Icon - MessageThe icon we use to represent an email action. Icon - Down ChevronUsed to indicate a dropdown. Icon - CloseUsed to indicate a close action. Icon - Dropdown ArrowUsed to indicate a dropdown. Icon - Location PinUsed to showcase a location on a map. Icon - Zoom OutUsed to indicate a zoom out action on a map. Icon - Zoom InUsed to indicate a zoom in action on a map. Icon - SearchUsed to indicate a search action. Icon - EmailUsed to indicate an emai action. Icon - FacebookFacebooks brand mark for use in social sharing icons. flipboard Icon - InstagramInstagrams brand mark for use in social sharing icons. Icon - PinterestPinterests brand mark for use in social sharing icons. Icon - TwitterTwitters brand mark for use in social sharing icons. Icon - Check MarkA check mark for checkbox buttons.
You are reading

Radishes: Early, Easy, Delicious

Search

Radishes: Early, Easy, Delicious

February 13, 2023

Toward the end of winter our inner garden clocks begin to tick. What can we sow, and soon? Cool-weather crops beckon, and top of the list is the photogenic radish. But are radishes easy to grow? My mother must have thought so, when she handed me radish seeds when I was a kindergartener. They were the first seeds I had ever sown. In my small hand they were big and round, easy to roll and to hold in unpracticed fingers. Absorbed, I dropped them into individual, finger-poked holes. I don’t remember waiting for them to mature, but I do remember the sense of wonder when plump bulbs began to emerge, each one resistant when pulled—fat and red when free of the earth.

I was hooked. Couldn’t read or write, but I could garden. My subsequent radishes never seem to have matched that perfection, although their leaves always look very healthy. So, ahead of the new growing season, I asked two experienced kitchen gardeners to share their radish-growing tips with me.

Read on for some wisdom from the gardens of California and Tennessee.

Photography by Marie Viljoen, unless otherwise noted.

Above: A rooftop-grown radish in Brooklyn.

Most radishes can be sown in pre-spring—around six weeks ahead of your last frost date. Winter radishes (like daikon, watermelon radish, and black radish) tend to be sown in fall, before the first frost date, to mature through the coolest months. Radishes can be grown in containers, in raised beds, or in-ground.

Above: Randi Rhoades with her ‘Bravo’ daikon radishes. Photography courtesy of Freckled Californian.

In Orange County, Southern California, Randi Rhoades is the Freckled Californian (her informative blog and Instagram handle), a gardener who transformed her home’s barren monoculture of lawn into what she describes as an “edible garden and pollinator paradise.” It is flourishing and diverse. It took seven years (“and counting,” clarifies Randi, in an email.” I don’t know that I’ll ever consider it finished.”) Her lush Zone 10b garden sees dry summers and wet winters (at least, if all is well). Pomegranates, persimmons, avocados, and artichokes share the productive space along with many other crops, and a slew of radishes, including her favorite winter cultivar, a daikon called ‘Bravo.’

Above: ‘Bacchus’, ‘Helios’, ‘Redhead’, ‘Pink Beauty’, and ‘German Giant’ grown by Randi Rhoades. Photography courtesy of Freckled Californian.

Randi grew up in a home where radishes were treasured for their greens. They were typically added to soup (“at the end, where they would just wilt,” she explains), and she says that her mom would specifically seek out “the radishes with the best tops at the grocery store.” Now, she thinks radish-thoughts when the weather starts to cool in fall, and especially if rain is in the forecast. “I start to sow radishes directly in the garden,” she says, “and continue to succession-sow them during the cooler months… The rain will water them in well—less work for me!”

Does she find them easy to grow? Yes, and no. Radishes are easy to germinate (they make good sprouts), and are also “a crop where minimal investment is necessary,” says Randi, because they don’t take up much space and they grow quickly. “But issues with bulb-formation can frustrate gardeners.” These could be due to inconsistent moisture: “The seeds, and beginning stages of growth, are so shallow-rooted, that it’s easier for them to dry out compared to other crops.”

Above: My April radishes grown in Brooklyn.

And she cautions against over-fertilizing. “This often results in too much nitrogen for your radishes,” explains Randi, “so they tend to form only greens and no bulbs.” Although greens can be a good thing. Remember the soup… (But this could be my problem; I amend spring soil in my pots with organic granular fertilizer. This season, I’ll skip.)

Above: A radish grown by Hemalatha Gokhale in Nashville’s Farm in the City community garden.

Across the continent, in Nashville, Tennessee, Hemalatha Gokhale—she is @nashvillegrows on Instagram—raises radishes in Zone 7a, both in her home garden and in a community plot, Farm in the City, where she shares in harvests as various as asparagus, velvety pumpkin leaves, fresh chickpeas, roselle, okra, and muscadines. Her radish-sowing schedule is almost continuous, “except for about four weeks in January, and four weeks in the summer,” she says.

Above: The green radish is ‘Luobo’- “super productive and mild in flavor,” says Hemalatha. Photograph by Hemalatha Gokhale.

Although she finds radishes an easy crop to grow, Hemalatha recommends staggering planting times and planting several varieties to ensure success “since weather and rainfall can vary so much. You hedge your bets better by not relying on one planting time or one variety.” She relishes eating them nose to tail, roasting the bulbs, adding the leaves-with-bulbs to soup, and using the greens interchangeably with other brassicas. Even the tender seed pods are eaten: “They work beautifully in sambar (the spicy Indian lentil soup).”

Above: “Sometimes you pull up an enormous, long-forgotten watermelon radish and you think to yourself, what a wonderful world.” Photograph by Hemalatha Gokhale.

Radish Tips

Above: Circle of radish life. Photograph by Hemalatha Gokhale.

@NashvilleGrows – Hemalatha Gokhale

  • Growing: “Planting multiple varieties of radish at the same time in multiple staggered sessions means that something will thrive regardless of the weather.”
  • Eating: “I boil the leaves and then finish them off with a drizzle of an oil-based dressing with herbs and spices. The leaves are also fun to roast and crisp up.”
Above: “Before starting a garden, I never knew vegetables could be this vibrant, this colorful, this flavorful.” Photograph by Randi Rhoades.

@FreckledCalifornian – Randi Rhoades

  • Growing: “Thinning radishes really helps the larger varieties grow most uniform. Cut out any radish sprouts you want to thin as opposed to pulling them. Radishes are delicate at first, so this helps to not disturb the root system.”
  • Eating: “Raw, with your favorite dip. It’s also wonderful to lightly sautée radishes in some butter, seasoned with salt and pepper, and served as a side.”

No doubt there are complicated ways to eat radishes but, like our two radish growers, I believe these brassicas shine when treated very simply, and with respect.

How to Eat Them

Above: Mandolined radishes with EV olive oil, salt, and ground elder flowers.
Above: French breakfast radishes on toast with miso-butter.
Above: Got duck eggs? Serve them with sliced radishes and ramp leaf salt.
Above: 8-minute (large) hens’ eggs with watermelon radish and flaky slat.
Above: A spring salad of peppery radish, sweet beet, sour boquerones, and spicy arugula flowers.
Above: Warm potato and dill salad topped with crunchy sliced radishes.
Above: A winter salad of creamy burrata with aged balsamic and shaved watermelon radishes.

This spring, in my Brooklyn windowboxes, I will sow radishes, again. I won’t feed them, but hopefully they will feed me.

See also:

(Visited 1,017 times, 1 visits today)
You need to login or register to view and manage your bookmarks.

Have a Question or Comment About This Post?

Join the conversation

v5.0