Topic: My first parsnip !

[fitzsie]

I posted earlier a photo of my little plot of veg garden. My first attempt at seriously growing veggies,

Well, I'm still eating my tomatoes and today I pulled out my first parsnip !!  Yeah, a beauty !!!  I can't complain at that !!!

Tasted really creamy in this evenings stew.  Definitely going to make some soup !! That's if the rest of the parsnips are performing as well.

[Jayb]

Well done, it looks a beauty 
The taste only gets better as they mature, particularly once it gets cold enough for frosts.
What variety did you grow?

[GrannieAnnie]

Glad to hear of your success  and your handsome parsnip. Eating from ones own garden has to be one of the best joys in life.

[fitzsie]

What variety did you grow?

Just checked the packet and they are Tender and True.

I know I should wait for some frost but had to pick another last week for Sundays roast dinner.  It went with freshly picked runner beans, my potatoes and my marrow. 

[Jayb]

Tender and True, a nice variety and do well when I've grown them. Although I tend to grow Gladiator F1 (or F2 from saved seeds), as they do so well here and are great at resisting carrot root fly which is a big nuisance in my garden.

Sounds delish 

[jimc]

It is a great sensation to be able to harvest your own food and eat it.
I had never tried parsnip until about 9 or 10 years ago. It was hard to get germination initially then after the first bed I left some to go to seed so now I get a self sown crop every year. Sometimes the weeds are too many parsnips but they are fairly easy to remove or just let them get a little established then harvest them as babies just leaving enough to go on to maturity and full grown.
Fresh seed is required for perfect germination.

[Digeroo]

I leave some parsnips to flower every year because the insects love them.  The seeds then scatter around and I reckon at that  stage I get 100% germination.  There are currently thousands of them coming up all over the place.   

I tend to thin out some of the ones I sowed in Feb/mar and find they taste good.  A bit of a fry in some butter seems to sweeten them up/

[boydzfish]

Didn't get any parsnips this year but was given another half plot with some gone to seed and saved some. I was going to put some in wet tissue to check viability but where I had left the stalks by the compost bins they are coming up like mad!! I even harvested some for myself and may try transplanting some of the compost bin ones as an experiment. I think they are Tender and True variety.

[strawberry1]

I have heavy clay soil and have grown gladiator for the past few years. They grew massively long and I had such trouble trying to prise them out. I tried guernsey this year, half as long, omg they have grown three times as wide and are bolting so out they come. This time I had to use a crowbar and the parsnips are like wood. So no more home grown parsnips for me, I am getting too old to be prising them out. I ended up with backache and value for effort, they are so not worth it for me. My plot isn`t that big so whatever I grow has to be worth while and parsnips are joining my blacklist