[sunshineband]

I grow turnips in with root veg, even though they are brassicas and  that seems to work OK for me 

They are not in the ground long, which I hope means they are not going to spread disease/leave disease behind 

I hope 

[Rangerkris]

Faz sent me some snowball turnips last year and they grew a treat.  I would be happy to grow again this year.

[solway cropper]

I much prefer the taste of swedes and they do actually grow up here. Trouble is they stay in the ground about twice as long to get a decent crop and, yes, the cabbage whites do infest the leaves. I'll try a row of turnips this year and use them in soups/stews. Should be able to mask the flavour that way 

[janette]

try golden ball turnip and use them very small golf ball size in the summer they are delicious

[BostonInbred]

Ive had spectacular success with turnips, and they are delicious - i would say there more like potatoes but juicier,  ive even made Bombay Potato using them instead of tates. We took to baking them in tinfoil in the wood burning stove last winter like baked potatoes, works fabulously well, really tasty. And seriously easy to grow. Cant think of a bad thing top say about turnips. I grew the Snowball types and a couple of other varieties.

[sunshineband]

Never thought of roating them like this. Thanks for the heads up BiB 

[Rangerkris]

We was cutting ours into strips and cooking then is some olive oil, most tasted great i had a few that made me pull funny face's.

[sunshineband]

We was cutting ours into strips and cooking then is some olive oil, most tasted great i had a few that made me pull funny face's.

 

[arugula]

One nugget of info i got from some guy down at site today was if u can grow turnips u can grow anything 

Now assomeone whos never grown a turnip in his life (yet) how correct is this lil gem of info 

Well we tried two varieties last year for the first time, Market Express and one other whose name eludes me atm  . Both grew pretty well, but I wouldn't say they are our best ever cropping veg (per. the axiom that if you can grow turnips ... etc).

 

[davethespread]

i have never tried them what do they taste like

[Cazzy]

I grew them in my first year and no one liked them.  Probably because we were brought up calling swede turnip and expected them to taste much the same.

[arugula]

i have never tried them what do they taste like

Hard to describe Dave. I'll start with a bit sort of peppery like radishes but not as spicy, quite delicate really  ...  ..... anyone else got a description?

[Rangerkris]

The ones that never made me pull funny face's were nice. Ermm not sure how to explain the taste really.

[scabs]

First timer here, put turnips and swede in quite late last year as an 'oh well, nothing ventured' experiment and did really well: two full 6' rows of swede (yummy) and two 4' rows of turnips, with a few gaps (not sure I liked them as much.)

I'll definitely be trying both again this year.

[Swing Swang]

Turnips are great - v, v easy IMO.

They come right at the end of the catalogues, but are one of the first plants to go in each year. Under cloches in Feb, then in small quantities throughout the year. For quick-growing varieties I tend to treat them like radishes in that I don't bother too much about rotations. Maincrops go in the brassica bed.

The thinnings are a good salad veg. The Roots are great boiled/roast/stewed etc. You can 'sweet' pickle them with just one slice of beetroot in the jar and they go a lovely pink colour.

Great, great grandfather used to go down the allotment very early on Sundays (he was a Methodist lay preacher so didn't want to be seen!) and pull the ones to be roasted for Sunday lunch. As they bruise easily he used to handle them with cotton gloves, and insisted on doing all the prep himself. I can still hear him saying,
'Dammee boy, what! Ne'er like a turnip' to the turnip-haters!

SS