“and do you know of a good white type? this one is prolific but they tend to form small tubers.”
The white type it looks like you have looks similar to White Fosseau. There are several named white types, at least 2 that are bigger than your red ones, White Mammoth, and i forget the other one right now 
I think I was thinking of Stampede, should be bigger than white fosseau, i dont have it but i dont think it is as big as white mammoth. Stampede is said to be more cold hardy and earlier maturing for northern growing. But i think i prefer white mammoth the best, for its size, very nice.
As far as the bean gas side effect…, i find that, like beans, if you bring to a hot boil and blanch and then dump all the water off, 2 or 3 times in a row, before cooking, it really helps. There is sort of a oily film that rises to the boiling water surface that needs blanched/heated/washed out of these roots before cooking/preparing, to lessen this side effect.
Sunchoke Natural Gas Co.
I just started growing them this spring. I have 6-7 stems and I’m wondering if I should try to harvest any or wait until next fall.
Anyway, I have highlighted that quote because I was watching videos about sunchokes this a.m. and stumbled across this video about pickling sunchokes that sounds good.
Fermenting them is definitely good, but just like cucumber pickles you NEED to add a tannin source or they won’t remain crisp. It does greatly improved digestibility to ferment them.
I also find they maintain nice texture when simmered for about 30 minutes in water with lemon juice. This acid plus heat process is way more effective in breaking down the inulin than is the more commonly recommended slow cooking which turns them to mush.
I do not think they get bigger if they stay in the ground a second year. They only crowed up and get smaller. after the killing frost. I would dig them up inventory how many you have and rebury them. If you have enough to actualy pickle go ahead but otherwise use them a few at a time since every freeze thaw will convert inulin to fructose making them sweeter.
Sunchokes are native and found in much of N. America. They do produce seed and spread vigorously.
I just pulled some up of ours, I’ll try them in lemon simmered! thanks for the suggestion.
the whole house can get pretty stank after we have these for dinner usually.
Ironically they are notoriously bad at setting seed. When intentionally trying to get seed from them I average between about 1 and 3 seeds per head. Of those, many don’t sprout. The primary way they spread is through tubers, but a fair number of named clones have been selected for producing tubers right near the original stems rather than spread all over underground at the ends of long rhizomes like the wild type.
I’m kind of excited right now because I’ve been working on hybridizing jerusalem artichokes with annual sunflowers and just got done tasting a bunch of my seedlings for the first time. Some of them are delicious! If anyone is interested in a very tedious read on my perennial sunflower breeding work (including but not limited to jerusalem artichokes) feel free to check out my periodically updated blog post on the subject: