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The Green Thumb Thread!
Husband thinks you are probably just keeping them half/alive, or half/dead, whichever way you look at it and that they will probably go mouldy. Can you not import a packet of seeds or is that illegal?If you have the seeds, evidently you plant them in the spring, and harvest in autumn. It could be that there are varieties of parsnip there, but they don't look like parsnips.
When a French woman lived with us for a year and Mum dished up swede, she said that in France they only feed it to the animals. Perhaps you should investigate animal feedstuffs?
Never thought I would manage to post on a gardening thread! Very proud!
Yay! A reply! Thanks Carol!I'm not holding out much hope, to be honest. Although I did have success with growing pineapples in Africa by doing this.
Hubby is probably right. I'll buy some seeds when we're home at Christmas if I can find any in the shops then.
The garden centres must sell seeds in the winter, right?
Bringing seeds shouldn't be a problem.
I've spent a couple years asking various people here about them, most recently my cleaner yesterday. I gave her a taste and spent an age trying to find an Azeri or Russian translation that worked to no avail. (Alla is wonderful. How cool is it that she's literate in THREE languages?)
We talked about the animal feed aspect too. No go.
They've got something that translates to turnip here. Nothing like turnip nor swede, though. It's more of a really bitter big white turnip shaped radish that's not quite horseradish.
They've also got 'proper' red radishes, which are lovely.
Thinking on, think I'll try and get swede seeds too...
Consult the Internet when there's such a wealth of knowledge in the group, GL?Tut tut.
Where's Rosemary when we need her?Parsnip sage Rosemary in time?
Although that was helpful. Thanks.Gonna bin the tops now.
Patti (baconater) wrote: "Yay! A reply! Thanks Carol!I'm not holding out much hope, to be honest. Although I did have success with growing pineapples in Africa by doing this.
Hubby is probably right. I'll buy some seeds ..."Husband says he buys his seeds on line. Recently son sent him seeds from Singapore. Can you not buy them like that?
The word for parsnip in Russian is pasternak. Perhaps Alla thought you were discussing literature?
As in Boris. ;)Alla said that's something different to what we know as parsnip.
I like your poetry, GL. Millions wouldn't, but I do.
Gingerlily - Elephant Philosopher wrote: "Where's Rosemary when we need her?Parsnip sage Rosemary in time?"
Seriously, that was dead clever!
Husband thinks big white turnip thing like a radish is probably a radish. It can have a black or white outside, and be very long and come from Japan etc.
An ex boyfriend's father used to grow big long white Japanese radishes in Canada.They'd blow your head off.
Patti thinks Im clever :-) :-)
Wish you luck with your quest, I do like parsnips, roasted with the roast beef :-)
With roast pork this evening.Been rather overdoing the pork since I've found it for sale here. :)
I made curried parsnip soup yesterday. I should think that seeds would be around at Christmas.
Someone I know invented a growing system and grows onions and other similar sized vegetables in large plant pots. That is what I was looking to get for myself.
Would it surprise anybody to know that I hate parsnips as much as I do toblerone, cats, and Christmas adverts? :) I despise parsnips - evil, evil, things. The devil's haemorrhoids. Anyway, back OT. I do gardening myself _ I'm happy to answer any questions, especially potato questions.
Parsnip is the only vegetable I'm not keen on. Always buy fresh seed every year. It deteriorates really quickly. You also need soft, sandy soil or they'll fork. Good for a Rude Veg contest. :)
Dave sez Sainsburys in b'wade was overrun with mince pies and Christmas tat when he was there last weekend. Just so wrong!
Even wronger is that he brought me back a cadburys cream egg!
Yes, wronger is a word now. Deal with it.
Kath wrote: "Parsnip is the only vegetable I'm not keen on. Always buy fresh seed every year. It deteriorates really quickly. You also need soft, sandy soil or they'll fork. Good for a Rude Veg contest. :)"At last - somebody on this site agrees with me on something! :)
Jay-me (Janet) ~plum chutney is best~ wrote: "I made curried parsnip soup yesterday. I should think that seeds would be around at Christmas.
Someone I know invented a growing system and grows onions and other similar sized vegetables in..."
Unfortunately, big pots and bags of dirt are stupid expensive here.
Like £25 for a 5l bag of potting soil.
I'm not too keen on the parsnip either, though my wife loves them. Glad the potato was discovered.Don't worry about sowing them late either. When planted early in the season, mine always grew too big. I started sowing just a few every four weeks.
Kath wrote: "Parsnip is the only vegetable I'm not keen on. Always buy fresh seed every year. It deteriorates really quickly. You also need soft, sandy soil or they'll fork. Good for a Rude Veg contest. :)"Cross post! Forking 'ell!
Make a parsnip shaped hole in the ground with a steel bar. Fill it with sandy soil. sow the seeds in the centre. The parsnip will take the easiest route.
OK. just read the most recent comments. I can see I'm going to have to start from the beginning if this is going to make anything approaching sense.
Good luck with that Rosemary!
Well I like parsnips. Roasted, made into crisps, soup or wine.Seed needs to be fresh like Kath said, and you need to grow it in sandy soil like David said. But they are easy to grow from seed!
I have such an earworm now :) My own theme toon
Well, if I can't find seeds come December you'll have to post them to me, Nosemanny,We'll have time.
I can do that :)
Yay! Love you Nosemanny!And swede!
Bit late but those white radishes are called mooli or Daikon or Japanese radishes. Carol - I was also told parsnips (panais) are for 'only for ze pigs' by a French friend.
Lynne (Tigger's Mum) wrote: "Bit late but those white radishes are called mooli or Daikon or Japanese radishes. Carol - I was also told parsnips (panais) are for 'only for ze pigs' by a French friend."Those French are just too picky, aren't they? Not just about foreign words, but also now we have swedes and parsnips!
Once tried to get a quiche in Alsace without ham or bacon in it, when in vegetarian mode. Nearly run out of the shop by disturbed customers!
Luckily now I mainly visit Belgium, where the national dish is chips, Jupiler beer and chocolate!The chips I believe are deep fried twice and are certainly very tasty! Was nearly going to write something about Scotland here, but have decided not to in the interests of politeness. Anyway will probably get deleted as nothing to do with gardening, so to ensure I won't, I will mention that I have personally grown one very small tomato plant this summer and it has given me four incredibly small tomatoes. Green fingers, eh!
They can eat sea urchins genitals raw but not parsnips, give me parsnips everytime.
Euw! Bet that makes their eyes water. The sea-urchins, not the French, I mean.
Stood on a sea urchin off the coast of Kenya once.Excruciating.
The cure is to put mango on it, believe it or not.
Needs summat to take away the taste, I suppose.
Lynne (Tigger's Mum) wrote: "They can eat sea urchins genitals raw but not parsnips, give me parsnips everytime."Never heard of that! Have you come across those little songbirds, with a name like orlan, I think, which are eaten whole and the bones are crunched in the mouth. People are meant to place a napkin over their face when they eat one, as it looks so disgusting. Evidently the late Francois Mitterand was a keen eater of them and when he stopped his chemotherapy in the last few weeks of his life, that was one of the delicacies he ate.
Ortolans. They are a kind of bunting and that's one of the things that make me feel a little despair.
My resident parsnip person says that the soil does not have to be sandy (although carnoustie carrots in their sandy soil are, of course, famous) but that you should never grow them in fresh compost, only old, and that is true of all root vegetables. If you grow large parsnips then it does not matter if they fork or not.Talking about rude forked veg, I have never seen mandrake, which is famous for that. It has been associated through the centuries with witchcraft and an infusion of it was evidently given to people crucified on the cross. It would not only help their pain, it would also make them lose consciousness. The Romans would take them down and then be annoyed to see them walking round later, having recovered.
They reckon you have to cover your ears when pulling a mandrake because they scream and the sounds sends you mad. With me, who'd notice? ;)
Anyway, I've got a question about growing parsnips.
Can't get them here, which is really odd as root veg is big here in Baku. I've asked lots of locals and they've never heard of them.
Dave brought a couple kilos back from the UK earlier this week and I've set the tops in a shallow saucer of water. I'm seeing small green shoots but no roots forming yet.
I'm wondering if they grow and go to seed, will we be able to harvest the seeds to grow more? We've a couple of garden plots at school we could use but of course I'll have to manage them inside over the winter somehow.
Can anyone help?