For my whole gardening life I've tried to grow rutabaga. Never once have I successfully done this. Of all the vegetables, it was this peasant root I couldn't produce. And then I did and I was so excited I took 6 portraits of myself with it.
Despite my super-cool demeanour in these glamour shots, I'm Gangnam Style dancing on the inside.
I understand only a ridiculous person would do something like a) take self portraits with their favourite rutabaga, and then b) publish those photos thinking people would obviously be very interested in seeing them.
But, I feel like most humans enjoy photos of David Beckham, kittens hangin' in there, and foods associated with famine. If you're interested I also have a compelling self portrait with a potato.
This 7 pound baby made mashed rutabaga for 12 people at Thanksgiving dinner, with enough left over to have another Thanksgiving dinner the next night for 12 more people.
Instead of doing that though, I froze the leftover mash into 10 individual sized portions that I can pull out as a side dish all winter long.
Which begs the question, what am I going to do with the other 30 rutabagas I grew. One option is to carve it.
I know. It's terrifying.
Halloween
Carved turnip (which is not a rutabaga, more on that later) were the original Halloween pumpkins. National Geographic has a really interesting article about the history of the carved turnip that dates back thousands of years. Ireland (these are a people who love a root vegetable portrait) popularized the ghost turnip
I mentioned that turnip is not the same thing as rutabaga. One is not just a bigger version of the other.
A rutabaga is a cross between a turnip and a cabbage. The wacky cousin.
I'll have to try waxing them, like you see in grocery stores, because nothing says I appreciate your hard work and hospitality like the holiday hostess gift of a head sized waxed root vegetable.
The trick to finally successfully growing rutabaga? I think I just wasn't watering them enough. Or maybe they got more sun.
Or maybe it was the spirit of ghost rutabagas with a little help from Annie Leibovitz. Either way, I have many more rutabagas to dig up once the frost has hit them. Frost sweetens them and they can stay in the ground all winter if you mulch them with straw or soil.
If you thought this was exciting, wait'll I pull my parsnips.
Mary C
My Norwegian mother in law got me started on rutabagas. She served them with all the holiday meals. I've never seen a fresh one, that root is so thick! We just get the waxed ones at the market.
Rachel
I am desperately trying to grow rutabega here in Northern California, and the blighters will NOT germinate. Very annoying. So yes, I am completely on board with photos with them, in my mind they are the ultimate celebrity selfie...
Jan in Waterdown
“Wait’ll I pull my parsnips”??
That sounds kinda kinky! Can I watch? 😉
Eileen
I LOVE rutabagas. Just bought some pathetic ones at the grocery yesterday because the suddenly cool weather caused cravings. I asked of the one farmer at market who has had them and he said they had a crop, then 5 years nothing, and then they had some again. He just shrugged. His were gnarly and a pain to clean and prep and therefore a ton of waste. Nothing like your awesomeness!
Lynda
We love veggie pics! Especially with the proud veggie parent in them. Can't wait for the parsnips.
This year was the first year in quite a while where I was not struggling through a drought May-July, so maybe that's also part of the secret. And fluffy soil. Let us know once you figure it out like you did the loofas.
Marilyn Meagher
Look at the rutabaga on that one! Beauty. I love it. Mashed,butter,salt,pepper yum.
Karen
Can't WAIT to try carving one. ~ karen!
Jan in Waterdown
You forgot maple syrup!
Dawn
That is stunning! I pulled off my first Brussels sprouts this year after many years of trying so I totally get it. Success is sweet, especially in rutabaga form!
Karen
How'd your sprouts do? ~ karen!
Dawn
They are so good! I still have a few plants growing too, even though they wouldn't sprout I grew them for my chickens. This year though we all get the goods.
Jane
Great job, Karen! We gardeners are nutsy like that. While my mother was still alive, one year I managed to grow a 23-oz tomato. (Also managed a 20-ozer as well.) I still have a pic of my mother holding the tomato with both hands.
Karen
We humans love our disturbingly large vegetables. And flowers! ~ karen
Teri on the (so-far-not-so) Wet Coast
An acquired taste, the rutabaga. As a child/young person I would eat them raw, if forced, but cooked I thought they smelled and tasted like sweat socks boiled in liquid dirt. Flash forward 50 odd years and I now love them but have never tried growing them. You get an “atta girl” for that amazing veg. Nicely done. By the way, have you tried them in stew with the other usual root veg suspects? Parsnips, carrots, potatoes. One feels so virtuous eating all those veggies one can almost overlook the delicious beef hanging it all together. Dinty Moore was on to something. Serious winter fare.
Karen
Dinty Moore, lol!! ~ karen
Natalie
The promise of 6 portraits with your giant-sized root veg def made me click in to see! Love it!
Karen
THE APPLE HARVEST IS COMING UP NEXT. Not that it'll be as impressive as the head sized rutabaga, but still it's something to look forward to. ~ karen!
LeeAnne
Karen,
After all the previous and very eloquent comments this one is pretty lame but I really enjoyed the links you provided. I'd never heard of Stingy Jack. Thanks for a great post.
Karen
Hi LeeAnne! I thought they were interesting too. ~ karen!
Kirsten
That’s awesome, have you ever grown fennel successfully? Mine went to crap again this summer and I don’t know what in the heck I'm doing wrong?
Karen
Hi Kirsten. You might be growing the wrong kind of fennel. There are two different types of fennel you can grow. The type that's most common only grows fronds. The type that bulbs is less common, even though it's what most people want to grow. So you maybe just grew the wrong type as opposed to doing anything wrong. :) ~ karen!
Margaret
Thanks, I was not aware of that.
Chris
That is one massive rutabaga! I like all of the root vegetables but have never actually made one of these. My husband is not a fan of any squash-like items so I just make them for myself to enjoy. I can imagine all these root veggies roasted together with butter, garlic, and maybe a small dash of maple syrup. But PLEASE, don't carve these - major creepy!
Karen
You're right major creepy. Which is why i can't wait to try it. ~ karen!
Kathy
I found this very inspiring! A) that you had such success with these pesky slow growers. I gave up on them a long time ago, as the largest they ever got was about egg-sized. And B) that you can not only take cool root vegetable portraits, and write a whole article about them!
BTW in Scotland they are called Neeps!
Kathy
Karen
That's right! And swedes elsewhere. I meant to mention that, thanks! ~ karen
Lavada Shaft
Holy Crap on a Cracker! I do not like Rutabaga; however, I would parade that baby through the streets! Huge and gorgeous! Thanks for sharing.
Karen
I never even THOUGHT to ask if anyone had a baby stroller I could borrow. Thank you. ~ karen!
🌵Pamela of The Desert🌵
I absolutely love rutabagas and turnips. The earthy horseradish like flavor of rutabagas roasted next to their daintier, fantastic cousin-brother white and purple turnips and sweet orange carrots with a few unruly white parsnips adding their unique perfume then cooked till tender with butter salt and pepper. Cooked long enough to melt into a nutty brown sauce that’s turned into a beautiful elixir of the gods then simply placed next to a creamy cloud of mashed potatoes, a tenderloin filet of beef or prime rib and a freshly baked loaf of homemade French bread served with one’s favorite wine, is without doubt, one of life’s greatest pleasures. It is equivalent to achieving food nirvana.
I have no space to grow these gifts of the earth. I reveled in your showboating photos of a rutabaga fit for Costco size feed an aircraft carrier beauty and it damn well warmed my soul. For me, Karen—-You won the whole internet by bragging about your rutabaga crop.
Patti_is_knittinginflashes
We’ll bring the wine, Pamela of The Dessert. What time is dinner?
Lynda
I vote you as my next favourite food writer to whet an appetite!
Karen
Thank you. My intention was to win praise and compliments not the entire Internet but now that it's mine I'll do something about all the misinformation on it. ~ karen!
🌵Pamela of The Desert🌵
As I do not get any notifications that anyone has replied to my responses- I occasionally come by to check so I don’t come across like a jerk faced jerk.
I reply on the fly (so to speak) and it’s pretty much my emotional response to a prompt and I’ve never even met anyone else who feels the same way as myself about root vegetables. Sure, everyone likes a potato. Most can enjoy sautéed carrots but I’ve been a true loner when it comes to rutabagas and turnips. I sneak them into a hearty red wine based beef stew- As my pretend mentor Julia Child elaborated in her method of ritualizing a simple farm recipe into a daunting affair, bœuf à la bourguignonne. Pretend as in, I felt that she was literally posed over me as I took in her Boston based PBS program as a kid, sitting cross legged in front of our black and white TV, dreaming of France and food. I found my first copy of Mastering The Art of French Cooking at a garage sale when I was a teen and kept it until a house fire destroyed almost everything I owned at 31. My mother, an excellent home cook, was a no frills gal in the kitchen except for her ever present heels and she always wore a dress. Southern women of her era pretended to be respectable. She did however set me on my course of loving everything about the humble rutabaga and she never caved into dullness when she’d expect everyone to enjoy mashed potatoes mixed with mashed turnips as much as she did. My sister was hiding her portion in a napkin while I wanted seconds. That was when it started. I love those dirty roots right down to their spindly tails. Mom died young. I was 14. She took her fantastic southern cooking secrets with her except for the best pie crust on planet Earth (never seen one remotely close) that she’d taught me to make as a 3rd grader (when I was beset with Julia and Graham Kerr as my idols).
So, I’d love to try and grow rutabagas. We had a big garden in San Diego not far from my horse stable and the chicken yard. I loved the carrots and endless zucchini and every other squash. I kept the garden going after mom passed. It was lonely except for the 20 chickens, 1 Muscovy duck, a Guinea hen, a black angus cow, a horse and several dogs that shared our house. Mom was the intended gardener and I was a kid so the garden evolved into a mess and I went to college. But the love of those rutabagas and carrots and turnips never died.
All my travels seemed to find, in far off places, every kind of people have a different story and recipe for the lowly roots. But honestly I go back to the basic most rustic style of just letting them shine on you crazy diamonds- (Roger Waters is nuts but he wrote some brilliant lyrics.) Nod to David Gilmore as he clinches his teeth together.
Yeah, I’m a bit long winded. So sorry. But when you (Karen) brought up the least likely thing ever, that I’d never in a billion years think of writing about- Rutabagas and included photos of yourself posing like you are on the bow of the SS Minnow awaiting rescue and holding a massive orb like you are the proudest parent ever, I was “inspired.”
Karen
And I thought this whole time people were getting my responses. I'm going to have to get a new comment app immediately! You have lived a storied life Fikry. ~ karen!
Renee Ryz
well that just sounds delicious!
Randy P
Nice rutabaga - which marks the first time in my 7 plus decades of life that I have said that sentence to anyone, let alone a female type lady person.
Karen
I think as long as you don't say "nice rutabagas" you're fine. ~ karen!
Poppie
Well done ..rutabaga (always called them turnips growing up) was part of a rough mash I do every thanksgiving and Christmas (demanded) of turnip ,rutabaga ,parsnip, and carrot add butter ,some garlic, parsley (for colour) voila yummy side
By the way that rutabaga head was scary!
Karen
The rutabaga head is genuinely terrifying. I can't wait to try it but I'm guessing it takes forever to carve out the inside. ~ karen!
Sandra D
I love the size of it! I was never successful with turnips (and I'll ALWAYS call them that) - why didn't they change the name of the "other" turnip? Mine always got maggots on them - ugh.
Helen
Finally!!!! first comment. And a proud day for you too! Well done.
Karen
Thank you! I'm impressed with myself. ~ karen!