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Eating my Homegrown Radish - My Review

Back on day 35 or my radish growing fun, I harvested one of two radishes that I had growing on my apartment windowsill. You can view that post here if you're interested. I figured I'd give a review of how the radish tasted. The radish is also almost comically small as you can see here in these photos:

The RadishHand for scale

Yep, it was tiny compared to my (what I think is a regular-sized) hand but I wasn't going to let that stop me from chowing down on it. Eating my first born.. er first grown. First I chopped off the radish greens or leaves. I decided I'd just eat the root raw which tends to be the most common way to eat radishes. That or pickling them. I have to say, the taste and texture of the radish were actually quite delightful. For the most part it had a very mild, crisp, and fresh taste. That leads me to the top of the radish or the part directly below the leaves. That part was spicy! That took me by surprise. compared to the majority of the root, the top was very spicy tasting. Not quite the same spicy as eating a hot pepper but somewhere in that range of tastes. I don't know if this has anything to do with that portion of the radish being exposed more to the sun causing a spiciness? But I have to say that part of the radish was not my favorite. 

After eating the root I had to taste the greens. These leaves are hairy buggers so I cooked them first, of course. I don't think my tongue would have appreciate the hairy texture of a raw leaf. There weren't a whole lot of leaves since it was a single radish but I fired up the stove top and cooked it with a little bit of olive oil, salt, and garlic powder. I have to say the they were quite good. It reminded me a lot of the taste of spinach but with a little bit of the bitterness of mustard greens. But very light on that bitterness. I would definitely eat the radish greens again. I want to believe that they're healthy for you too. They're leafy greens, right? 

The greens before cookingThe greens after cooking

Overall, I did like the taste of the radish root sans the very spicy portion on the top. I've never been a huge radish person s me liking it might be related to the fact that I was the one who grew it. That may make me a bit biased. As for the radish greens, that really surprised me. They are quite good. If you buy radishes from a grocery store don't just throw those greens away. Try stir frying them up and see if you like it!

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