Aristocrats in ancient Rome regarded turnips as food reserved for poor people. In the American colonies, turnips — especially the greens — became associated with the diet of enslaved people.
Our tradition of carving pumpkins can be traced to Ireland, where scary faces were carved in turnips to ward off evil spirits. In England, the Turnip Prize is awarded annually to the worst example of modern art. First prize is a turnip nailed to a block of wood.
The French word for “turnip” (navet) is currently reserved for a special purpose. When exiting a movie theater in France, if one hates the film, one says “it’s a turnip.”
The turnip is “an ugly maligned old thing,” writes food historian Bill Price, but it “changed the course of history.” Farmers in fourteenth century Belgium began to alternate planting of cereal crops and turnips.
Cereals and turnips depleted different nutrients from the soil and restored different ones. To maintain soil productivity, farmers once had to leave land fallow some years.
By rotating crops, farmland could be productive every year. More food was grown, and more people could be fed.
The turnip was relegated to a new and ultimately more important role as fodder for the growing animal population. The turnip is an especially important food because all of it—root, stem, leaves—is edible, unlike say tomato and rhubarb, which have toxic leaves.
The New York Times offers 217 turnip recipes on its website, mostly for soup. Times food writer Melissa Clark did write nice things about turnips (“sweet and juicy, crisp and taut”), though that was 10 years ago.
We prefer turnips uncooked, the best way to enjoy the nice things Melissa Clark wrote about them. We peel a turnip, sliced it, and dip the pieces in a mayonnaise-mustard sauce.
Turnips can be cooked and mashed like potatoes. In fact, the two vegetables can be cooked and mashed together.
Peel 1 large turnip and 1 large potato and cut into several pieces. Place them in a pot, cover with water, bring to a boil, and cook at a low boil for 1/2 hour. Drain, add 1 pat of butter and a 1/4 cup milk or cream, mash, and season with pepper and paprika.
The leaves can be cooked like other greens like chard, but we find them bitter. Something sweet is needed to quiet the bitterness.
Turnips store very well, so buy some and keep them in the fridge through the winter. With the growing season having ended for most of our local produce, the availability of local turnips should be a source of praise, not scorn.
MOON Co-op is Oxford’s consumer-owned full-service grocery, featuring natural, local, organic, sustainable, and Earth-friendly products. The store, located at 516 S. Locust St. in Oxford, is open to the public every day. See it online at mooncoop.coop.
