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The things we do for love: Rutabagas

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Two lovely rutabagas
I must admit, I am not a big fan of this nutritious vegetable. But I am a Big fan of Mr. Big Food, and he loves rutabagas so I grow them occasionally. 

Rutabagas, or Swedes, are a cross between cabbage and turnips. Have you seen a rutabaga in a garden? Just exactly where are the cabbage genes being expressed?

In northern climates they can be grown in the spring. Here in Mississippi, I sowed the seed in early August– which was a bit too early, the seedlings struggled early on. They take about 90 days to reach harvest size but can be left in the ground later into the fall. “They” say rutabagas taste better after a frost. We shall see.

UPDATE: I peeled, sliced, boiled and mashed them as I was asked. Mr. Big Food turned them into a little casserole with a dash of nutmeg.  

When the girls were young, we had a policy– a rule. You don’t have to like it, you do have to try it. When you try it and you don’t like it, you say, “I don’t care for this, thank you.” To this day, Marlena Rose remembers this rule. 

7 Responses

  1. Thank you for the “permission” to comment!

    Rutabagas.

    My family is from the northeast – Massachusetts. That pretty much tells you all you need to know about our Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners.

    Of course, my parents moved from Massachusetts when I was three (my father was assigned to the Pentagon during WWII) and we never returned. My husband is a native Californian. As a result, the holiday dinners are set by me, and although they have been traditional, my kids always wanted to know why we ate “funny” foods. I tried to explain to them – sort of unsuccessfully, since we live in a very electric age – that the foods we celebrated with were the foods that were available to the people in that climate in that time. All roots. No greens. Stuff that would hold either in the ground or in a root cellar.

    My Mom died about 11 years before my Dad died. My Dad remarried – a native Californian. She didn’t “do” squash (butternut) or rutabagas…so for the last years of his life, I supplied him with his annual “fix” at the holidays.

    I always thought that rutabagas were a turnip variety…turnip x cabbage???

  2. By the way…I picked up a book at the Friends of the Library store – “Heritage Cookbook” by Better Homes and Gardens. It really isn’t so much a cookbook – although it does have recipes – as it is a history of America in the foods we eat. It traces the immigrations by the foods they brought with them. Really interesting.

    Sort of a “Tell me what you have for celebration dinners and I’ll tell you where you come from” kind of book.

  3. Another by the way…

    We don’t serve rutabaga with nutmeg…just butter, salt and pepper. Don’t mash it either…served as cubes.

    Butternut squash, though – mashed, lots of butter, brown sugar and nutmeg.

    No accounting for taste, is there!

  4. I will keep my eyes open for that book. Sounds exactly like something we’d like.

    You know, suek, your comments about available food got me thinking about something I’ve long thought about. That is the nutrients in foods through the seasons. Winter squash, high in calories you need to keep you warm through the winter. Early spring greens low in calories so you can burn off all those winter squash ones. I wonder if anyone has written on this? Do you know?

  5. Never heard of anything…but thinking about animals…nah. That won’t do anything.

    When you want to lose weight, you eat leaves and twigs (leafy stuff and stemmy stuff – like lettuce and asparagus, broccoli…that kind of stuff). When you want to gain weight (oh for the days!) you want to be eating roots and seeds. And the parts of plants that nourish the seeds – like squash and stuff. Peas and corn are seeds.

    But in connection with the seasons? aside from the obvious – that’s when they’re ready – no…never thought of it that way.

    Maybe all those Thanksgiving recipes…!

  6. Oh and by the way…those of yours don’t look like rutabagas to me – they look like turnips. Well, one does. The other just looks like a purple ???

    The rutabagas I’m familiar with have the purple top, but are definitely yellowish most of the way down.

    In some places I’ve lived, they were also coated with wax – presumably to keep them better for storage. In California, they’re not, and don’t keep much longer than a turnip will.

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