Jerusalem Artichoke Uses?

[GoDawgs]

Thanks to some varmint only one of the six JA tubers I planted last spring survived. Today I dug it up so that I could replant more tubers. I've never done these before so I wasn't ready for the 3 lbs of dug up tubers left after replanting! I have read about the problems resulting form eating too much of the stuff at once We will have to be judicious in the consumption. And I've read that once dug they only hold about ten days in the refrigerator.

A question for those of you who eat them: what's your favorite way to eat them? In salads? Cooked? Other? Inquiring minds would appreciate some suggestions!

Next time I'll only dig up what I want when I want them and leave the rest in the ground. With seven plants there should be a ton in the ground! But there will also be those pretty flowers late summer/fall..

[bower]

The best I've tasted was some kind of tidbit involving a shaving of the JA and bacon, on a cracker. It was good, exotic but good.
I have a patch in my garden but never bother to dig them.

[Harry Cabluck]

Never had any use for 'em. 'Druther eat ants.

[Tormahto]

Not really healthy eating, but I parboil them and then fry them, like potatoes.

Other than that, I've found out that I can sustain voles on them throughout the winter. One of my classic mistakes was growing a patch of them next to the road. The snow plow comes by, and buries them under several feet of snow. That snow bank takes about a month longer to melt than snow elsewhere. The voles dig after the shallow ones.

[rxkeith]

some one at church makes a dish with chokes each fall. it is a porridge like consistency.
there are onions in there i think. it tastes better than it sounds. i always take a serving of it
when she brings it in. if i remember, i will ask her for the recipe.


keith

[Shule]

A question for those of you who eat them: what's your favorite way to eat them? In salads? Cooked? Other? Inquiring minds would appreciate some suggestions!

If I harvest them in the fall, I like them baked, like potatoes (skins and all). Taste-wise and texture-wise, this is my favorite way to eat them. They're delicious. However, they have more inulin at this time than they do after they've endured more freezes.

If I harvest them in the spring, they're a lot more like carrots (they're firmer and sweeter). They'd probably go well in soups, stews, and stir fry. I'm not sure how they'd be this time of year.

One way I've always wanted to use them is to lacto-ferment them with other vegetables. The inulin seems like it would be great food for the bacteria.

[Cole_Robbie]

The flowers make a nice late summer bouquet addition.

[Tormahto]

So, what do you all have? Large? Small? Smooth? Knobby? Tan skin? Rose skin? Other?

[worth1]

I read they grow wild here in places.

[Tormahto]

The flowers make a nice late summer bouquet addition.

I'd have to break out the ladder, as mine grow to twelve feet.

[bower]

Ours are smallish and a bit knobby with tan skin. They aren't more than 4 ft tall in my garden, maybe 4.5 at the farm patch. Never seen a flower on any of them. Not even a bud.

[worth1]

Ours are smallish and a bit knobby with tan skin. They aren't more than 4 ft tall in my garden, maybe 4.5 at the farm patch. Never seen a flower on any of them. Not even a bud.

They probably don't live long enough before it gets cold.
We have millions of wild sunflowers here.
Now it makes me wonder if they aren't sun chokes.
I do see two distinct growth habits in the plants I see.

[Julianna]

On the english/UK forums i am on, they tend to grow a lot of Jerusalem artichokes. Then they all have a bunch of jokes and memes about fartichokes. But i digress.

So a lot of them are roasting them and then using them in soup purees... Either as a singular soup or maybe as a combo root soup. They all claim roasting dulls a bit of the effects of aforementioned name.

I have wanted to try them.and never got to it. Maybe this year.

[GoDawgs]

So, what do you all have? Large? Small? Smooth? Knobby? Tan skin? Rose skin? Other?

There are clumps:



There are small ones:



There are a good number:



I bought them from Jung and they didn't list a named variety. What I dug up were smaller than the nice fat tubers I got but I'm thinking that after the plants settle in and aren't dug up for a while, the tubers might get bigger.

[GoDawgs]

Thanks for the input, everybody! Searching for recipes is one thing but getting actual suggestions is valuable to me.

I remembered I had made a grow sheet combining stuff from several online sources so I pulled it up and reread it.

One source said that once dug, JAs will hold about 10 days in the reefer while another source says several months.

Several sources confirmed that the inulin level is reduced after frosty weather sets in.

One suggestion for small tubers: "Rather than struggling to peel small, knobby tubers, scrub them well and then roast them with a little olive oil and sea salt. After they’ve cooled, eat them as finger food by squeezing the soft middle into your mouth — a North American food practice that dates back more than 1,000 years."

I plan to roast some sweet potato chunks tomorrow to go with the port roast and I think I'll try roasting some of the small ones as well and see how that goes.

[Tormahto]

Ours are smallish and a bit knobby with tan skin. They aren't more than 4 ft tall in my garden, maybe 4.5 at the farm patch. Never seen a flower on any of them. Not even a bud.

They probably don't live long enough before it gets cold.
We have millions of wild sunflowers here.
Now it makes me wonder if they aren't sun chokes.
I do see two distinct growth habits in the plants I see.

If you find a lot of them in the flood plain along a river, they're likely sun chokes.

[Tormahto]

So, what do you all have? Large? Small? Smooth? Knobby? Tan skin? Rose skin? Other?

There are clumps:



There are small ones:



There are a good number:



I bought them from Jung and they didn't list a named variety. What I dug up were smaller than the nice fat tubers I got but I'm thinking that after the plants settle in and aren't dug up for a while, the tubers might get bigger.

How far out from the mail stem did you dig?

[Shule]

So, what do you all have? Large? Small? Smooth? Knobby? Tan skin? Rose skin? Other?

Here's what mine looked like the first time I harvested them (they were a wild seed-grown kind from Kansas; they looked similar in future years; maybe a little bigger sometimes, and a little smaller other times). It should be noted that regardless of the shape (even the super long ones), they were all great baked, including the skin (but some finished cooking a lot faster than others, and not because of the size). Because I grew multiple seeds, I had several genetically distinct types (some were super long; some were like chicken feet; etc.).

. . .
How far out from the mail stem did you dig?

About 1 to 3.5 feet, depending.

The one with a bite out of it was baked first. I didn't wrap them in foil when I baked them (I don't do that with potatoes, either).

Note that they can grow significantly away from the initial tuber in the spring before they sprout (like a few feet). One time, I transplanted one in the spring, and it branched out and sprouted a few feet away.

All the pictured ones are fall-harvested.

[GoDawgs]

How far out from the mail stem did you dig?

About 2', In fact, a whole lot more since I forked up the whole bed so I could de-grass it and replant. It's a 3x11' area with timbers on each side half buried although I have no doubts the JAs will find their way under them. That's OK.

[Tormahto]

How far out from the mail stem did you dig?

About 2', In fact, a whole lot more since I forked up the whole bed so I could de-grass it and replant. It's a 3x11' area with timbers on each side half buried although I have no doubts the JAs will find their way under them. That's OK.

Years ago, I read that the ones that grow under grass can get bigger than the ones grown on bare ground. No real proof was provided. If you want a few smooth red-skinned ones, let me know. I don't know when the ground will thaw, here. But, it could be early this year, as there is no snow cover. (shouldn't have said that, knowing winter isn't over)

Now I'm trying to remember where I planted a possible new type (few/no knobs? tan), to me, last fall. I think I remember, but time will tell.