Being in Alaska I’m always in the lookout for things that can grow wild/semi wild or at least with little care. On that vein I was given a horseradish plant. It seems one is all I will need to create a small army of them. Or for now as many as can fit on the half whiskey barrel I placed it.
taste-wise I must say I found the leaves and the stalks pretty interesting by themselves. For those growing horseradish, how do you use them?
I don’t grow horseradish any longer but the way it is typically used is by grating (preferably outdoors with the wind behind you) and then making into a pungent sauce (different approaches available via search) or added to mustard.
I use leaves in fermenting cucumbers and ground roots as a base for meet/fish sauce…
I would be careful with this assumption! I mean the word “small”. In the right setting it is getting out of control very fast. I planted it in the middle of the poor lawn, this way, if it escapes the bed, I just mow it. Planting it near the fertile garden is a big mistake I made in my old place. I was fighting it for several years. It can travel 6-10 feet side-wise in a season to reach better soil .
We use horseradish root, freshly grated with other salad ingredients or on its own,
or grated and mixed with white cow’s cheese and clotted cream (this way, it can be stored for a while in the fridge).
I don’t grow it at the moment, but there is one somewhere in the yard growing on its own.
Also. you can mix a little with cabbage when you prepare sauerkraut.
I have it growing in a metal garbage can buried in the garden (it has escaped). I harvest mine (roots) in the fall after the leaves have been frosted back. I pull the can out of the ground, dump its contents, sort out the roots, refill the can with soil and a few roots and drop it back in the ground. Then I wash the roots and grate them for use. I’m finding mine isn’t very potent anymore and I’m wondering if I should look for a new variety to plant.
I grew them once and say never again, they can take over an area if you are not careful.
i grow one i got from Galinas awhile back, got it in almost total shade and it has grown but not much considering its near my compost pile, there’s a boat launch on the Aroostook river that has it spread from there to about 2 miles down river. during ice out the ice must scrape parts of the plant spreading it. if i ever wanted alot of it, it would be easy to harvest out of the silt / gravel riverbank there
I rented a house that had an abandoned horseradish plot. I tried to dig one up but it was so large I could only break off a piece. I made the mistake of putting it in a blender to grate. The fumes where so strong I had to go outside teary eyed and wait for the fumes to subside. It did taste great.
For now I have them in a half whiskey barrel. If they escape they belong in a horror movie.
Here is how it escaped at my place. After I decided that I have to kill it near the garden, I needed to find safer solution and I planted it into plastic bin (with draining holes) I didn’t have any extra space to put it, so I had to put it on a huge rock, one of the rocks forming a 7-8 ’ drop down at my old property. It was probably 5’X4’ of the rock exposed and part of it was covered with some vinca ground cover growing between the rocks . In the fall when I was going to empty my bin I found that I couldn’t move it. The root went through the drainage hole, traveled under vinca to the nearest crack - about 2.5’ and went right down. It was growing from that crack ever since.
I was going to warn him of the same thing. I had a garden where I had one plant. I always tilled my garden in the spring. Evidently one tuber was nicked by the tiller and I ended up with horseradish plants all over my garden, lol, lesson learned.
I grow them here in Fairbanks as an understory plant around fruit trees. They’re bulletproof, and every time I transplant one, the original resprouts. I’ve used the leaves to keep lactofermented pickles crisp, and grated the root as a condiment. A dependable and useful plant that will thrive with no attention.
I may do that. Basically the small amount of soil right under my trees is a small oasis in a sea of glacier moraine, even dandelions struggle to crack that nut.
Have you used the actual greens? They tasted like they could work in a salad or a burger.
Old thread, I know. I did a search for horseradish and this thread seemed appropriate.
My wife and I have dug roots and processed horseradish in the past. It was delicious with a good “kick”. I’ve been getting stuff in my FB feed for a bar in northern WI (Eagle River for anyone familiar) that does a “horseradish challenge”. I figured it was all hype, but decided I’d order a couple jars and pay the postage to find out.
Holy crap is all I can say. I had no idea horseradish could be this pungent. It is tenfold hotter/more pungent than anything we’ve had.
Is it due to the age of the root or what?
Eagle River, eh? Nice town, get down there maybe once or twice a year. I’m not entirely sure what it is that makes horseradish hotter, but I can tell you since moving to the U.P. from Central Illinois our horseradish doesn’t get as hot. It’s the same kind we grew there too; I dug the crowns and brought them up. I also don’t think it’s related to age of the roots. One clump we let sit for about 7 years before we dug it up. The roots were huge. About 2 to 3 in across, and growing straight down for several feet before they broke. But, it just didn’t have the make you black out heat I remember growing up. I have a loam soil here, in Illinois we had heavy yellow clay. Dad and I were wondering if the heat is not more related to soil type and amount of heat during the growing season. Maybe the amount of precipitation is also is a factor?
Well, I have no idea but this stuff is pretty incredible. If you get to Eagle River, check out Smugglers Bar.
I’m ordering some crowns to plant here. I doubt it’ll be as hot as the stuff from Smugglers, but I gotta try.
The chemical in horseradish that makes it hot is created when two different chemicals are mixed together when the cell walls are broken.
The more you break them the more it reacts. Once you add vinegar the reaction stops
So all horseradish gets extremely hot if you keep blending it for a long time before you lower the pH
You also need sulfur in the soil for it to make the compounds
Yep, I knew most all of that except the sulfur part. Ours was hot, but this stuff is unreal. Maybe I’ll pour the gypsum to the crowns I plant
I bet that’ll do the trick. Maybe some soils can hold more sulfur than others? Not 100% sure
Consulted with my soil buddy (biogeochemist) you want a clay at low pH and iron in excess for maximum sulfur holding capacity. Sulfate (like gypsum) would get less tightly held and more bioavailable by the clays than elemental sulfur
Apparently ferrihydrite would be the best form of iron