Digging Horseradish

 The thing about fresh horseradish is that it doesn't stay fresh very long.  In the refrigerator, the prepared radish begins to lose its fire in a matter of days although I will keep it for five or six weeks.  With the holidays upcoming, I want to have some really good radish on hand for making cocktail sauce or as a condiment for beef meals.  Many a Christmas Eve or New Year's Eve has found me out in the snow with a pan of hot water and a fork, thawing the soil and digging in the mud.  While that can be done, I have learned to plan ahead.  The ungrated roots can be kept in the refrigerator for weeks without losing any quality.  I have tried freezing the roots, but they lose texture and heat immediately.

 The weather has been mild and clear, the recent rain has drained away and the ground is not very frozen.  The weather is supposed to get colder and wetter this week so I figured I had better get out there.  The roots I want are an inch to two inches wide.  The larger roots at the crown are very dry and coarse, and the smaller ones whittle away to nothing when you peel them.  I look for a good sized crown, two or three seasons old, on the edge of the clump that is sending roots outward.

These outward growing roots are the ones that are trying to colonize and spread your clump into areas where you don't want it.  This nice root (above) is headed for the railroad tie retaining wall and will eventually send up sprouts in the walkway on the other side.

I ended up with a lot of bits and pieces that I threw in the compost, but they could all be replanted today to create a larger crop.  I saved out the two roots I wanted, rinsed them at the outdoor spigot, then in the garage utility sink, and finally brought them in the house.  I don't want to put any effort into scrubbing these, I just want them mostly clean to store for later.

I cut off the crowns and cut each root in half to fit into a gallon sized freezer bag.

This goes in the hydrator where it can stay for a month or so.  There is enough here to make about two pints prepared.

Preparing Horse Radish

 When I was digging potatoes I kept running into really nice horseradish root.  It is a little early in the season to harvest horseradish because cold weather brings out the flavor.  But its still good even if it isn't really hot.  So I don't waste it. I have three big clumps of horseradish along this bank.  Two of them stay nice and tidy and never try to wander off.  But this newest clump is next to a planting area which I am always digging up.  Not only is the soil soft and inviting, but it seems like each time you break a root it uses the opportunity to send up a plant at the breaking point.  

This nice little plant is not welcome here.

Whenever I come across a nice root, I dig as much of it out as I can.  Then I just pop it in a zipper bag and put it in the garden fridge.  My husband is on his way down the fall chores list and today he cleaned out the garden shed fridge.  Our house fridge was completely over run with beer and sweet tea and cabbages so it was a good time to deal with these roots.  This beats the heck out of digging them mid-winter when the ground is muddy and you're out in the snow with a pot of water trying to thaw the ground - but I do it that way too.  How else would we get fresh horseradish for home made cocktail sauce for our holiday shrimp?

The first step is to get a good veggie brush and scrub the roots clean.

These long, flexible carrot-like roots are my favorite to deal with not the coarse, gnarly type at the base of the plant.

Next, cut off the dirty, broken end and the little end that is too skinny to peel.

The roots are just like carrots.  There is no real skin to them, but you want to clean them up and inspect them.  The goal here is not to whittle them down to nothing.  Just scrape the discoloration off.

You could grate this by hand and if you want to  - more power to you.  But I use the food processor.  Here is also where they stop acting like carrots.  They are quire fibrous and tough to chop. You'll need a good chef's knife to dice the roots into something your food processor can handle.

Nothing special here, just a little 3 cup chopper.  I start with just a handful of root.

As the first ones get to a good consistency I keep adding more.  I put about half a cup of water in too to get the mixture moving.  You want to keep shredding until you get quite a fine mixture.

The consistency will begin to get pasty.  You can use vinegar instead of water if you want.  The vinegar will stop and stabilize the chemical process so the longer you wait to add the vinegar, the hotter your end result will be.  If you want more mild taste, go ahead and use vinegar.  This time of year before the roots go dormant the flavor is more mild anyway.

Use a spoon the remove the horseradish leaving the liquid behind.

I use a spoon to pack the mixture down bringing more water to the top so I can pour the liquid off.

Top off the jar with white vinegar.  I use the spoon to loosen the jar contents and allow the vinegar to percolate down to the bottom.  Some people add salt but its not necessary. 

Now you have a jar of nice fresh horse radish that will keep in the refrigerator.  I always date mine.  It will keep for three or four months but will start to lose its kick after about three or four weeks. We use it mostly for roast beef sandwiches.  When fresh it makes absolutely awesome cocktail sauce.  Just find your standard cocktail sauce recipe using ketchup, Worcestershire sauce and lemon juice.

Asparagus Bed

This weekend I put in my second asparagus bed. The first one has been abandoned to lawn, sadly, in year 3 when I would just be seeing some decent sized spears. The new asparagus bed is on the slope between the garden shed and the garden with the other "perennial" foods such as rhubarb, strawberries and horse radish. There is a clump of horse radish on each end of the asparagus row. Well, actually there was a clump on one end, and the first thing I needed to do was get a second clump started. The big clump of horse radish is on the back corner of the house. This batch I salvaged out of what was the chicken yard, and is now lawn. Since then, Tim has tried to get me to get rid of that clump, and I keep digging it up and transplanting it. But, in typical horse radish fashion, it only comes back bigger and thriftier. It likes the corner of the house. Sunday I examined the new shoots, and found two or three off to the side. I began digging, got two small roots, and then hit on a 3/4" root that seemed to disappear under the house. I dug about 20" out before I gave up and broke it off.

Because I don't want this thing heading off in new directions already, I broke that in half, put some in the fridge for later, and planted the more manageable remaining foot long root at the end of where I want the asparagus row to be. I got out a string line, drove a spike in the existing clump, measured from the edge, and drove a spike in the second clump. Then I began raking the thick mulch away from my new row.

They say you should make a ridge down the middle of your "trench" so you can set the crown on the top of the ridge and arrange the roots down the sides, encouraging them to grow down deeper. I did this, then spread a cup or so of bone meal down my trench.

The asparagus crowns had been soaking in water for a day, and were ready to plant. I laid out a tape measure, and spaced them along my trench about 18" apart.

Then I placed each one on top of my ridge, arranging the roots.

Each crown should be covered about 2" to 3" initially, with more soil or mulch being added throughout the season. Interestingly enough, I've read that the depth of the crown is what determines the thickness of the shoots. The more shallow crowns produce the thinner shoots, and the deeper crowns produce the thicker shoots.

While I was diddling around in the asparagus bed, Mike and Tim were scraping and regrading Mike's driveway. There was quite a buildup if gravel, dirt and moss which required the box scraper to remove, and the bucket to redistribute and level.

Then Mike got the priveledge of using Tim's "Two Ton Rock Crusher". Actually, it's only one and a half tons. But I affectionately call it Two Ton. When you roll it down the road, any gravel in it's way explodes into smithereens. Tim fabricated Two Ton in response to being gravely disappointed in all commercially available lawn rollers. He bought one a couple of years ago, and after using it once or twice, returned it's mangled fragments to the dealership in disgust. He then set about building a more usefull version. But you have to be careful. If the lawn is too wet, it will crumple it up like a a throw rug.

Only Mike and Tim could turn driveway rolling into recreation. They look like they're having a good time don't they?