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Roots

LIKE the grain of cereals, roots are to be regarded as storehouses of nutriment for the support of the young plant when produced in its first growth. The reserve nutriment thus laid up in the roots, and tubers, is chiefly starch, so that it must be remembered that they supply only one of the needful elements for human and animal sustenance, and development. But roots are by no means altogether destitute of mineral ingredients, chiefly as salts of potash. The water, sparingly used, in which roots are cooked, and which therefore gets to contain much of the soluble salts, should be utilized, or the roots should be cooked by steam. Already the Beet, the Carrot, the Onion, the Parsnip, the Horse Radish, and the Potato, have been told of in these pages; besides which the common Radish, and the Turnip, remain to be considered.

The common Garden Radish (Raphanus sativus) is a cultivated variety of the horse radish; it was not grown in England before 1548, though highly commended by Dioscorides and Pliny in ancient days. John Evelyn (Acetaria) gave it as his opinion "that this root is hard of digestion, inimicous to the stomach, causing nauseous eructations, and sometimes vomiting, though otherwise diuretic, and thought to repel the vapours of wine when the wits were at their genial club." "The Radish," says Gerarde, "provoketh urine, and dissolveth cluttered sand. Its edible root consists of a watery, fibrous pulp, which is comparatively bland, and of an external skin furnished with a pungent, volatile, aromatic oil, which acts as a condiment to the phlegmatic pulp. Radishes are to be eaten with salt alone, as carrying their pepper in them." The oil contained in the root, (and likewise in the seeds), is sulphuretted, and apt to disagree with persons of weak digestion. A young Radish which has been quickly grown, and is tender, will suit most stomachs, especially if some of the tender green leaves are masticated together with the root; but a Radish which is tough, strong, and hollow, "fait priser à l'ile d'Elbe; il revient." "The juice of the roots," wrote Culpeper, "made into a syrup doth purge by the urine exceedingly. I know not what planets they are under. I think none of the seven will own them." But for persons of sufficiently vigorous digestion radishes are preventive of boils, or skin eruptions, because of the pungent, volatile, sulphuretted oil which the outer rind contains. The pulp is chemically composed chiefly of nitrogenous substance, being fibrous, and tough, unless when the roots are young, and grown quickly; therefore they are commonly apt to obstruct the intestines. But mature, (not old) Radishes, of rapid growth, if boiled, or stewed, together with some of the succulent leaves, in their own moisture, or with a very little water put with them, are capitally antiscorbutic, and purifying to the blood, because of their sulphur. They will require long stewing so as to become tender. A syrup made with the juice expressed from radish-pulp, and sugar, is excellent for hoarseness, bronchial difficulty of breathing, whooping cough, and other pulmonary complaints. The black Radish is of special service against whooping cough, probably by reason of its volatile, sulphuretted oil. It is employed in Germany for this purpose by cutting off the top, and then making a hole within the root, which hole is filled with treacle, or honey, and allowed to stand thus for two or three days; afterwards a teaspoonful of the medicated liquid is to be given two or three times in the day, with a dessertspoonful of water, when required. For the cure of corns, if, after the feet have been bathed, and the corns cut, a drop or two of fresh Radish juice be squeezed over the said corns, on several consecutive days, these troublesome pests will wither, and disappear. "See the corn-curing hero comes!"

Also Radish roots sliced when fresh, and applied straightway to a carbuncle, will promote its cure. Roman physicians advised that Radishes should be eaten raw, with bread and salt, in the morning before taking any other food. And our poet Thomson has described as an evening repast :- "A Roman meal Such as the mistress of the world once found Delicious, when her patriots of high note, Perhaps by moonlight, at their humble doors, Under an ancient Oak's domestic shade, Enjoy'd spare feast, a Radish, and an Egg."

Probably the name Radish is from radix, a root, or because of the reddish colour. Shakespeare makes Falstaff speak jestingly of Justice Shallow, "When a' was naked, he was for all the world like a forked radish, with a head fantastically carved upon it with a knife."

The Turnip (Brassica rapa), belonging really to the cabbage order of plants, has become by cultivation from its wild state a most valuable food for cattle in the winter, and an excellent vegetable for our domestic uses. It exercises some aperient action, and the water wherein turnips are boiled will increase the flow of urine. The rind is acrid, but the green tops, especially of the Swede, when young, and tender, make a wholesome vegetable dish, being a succulent source of potash, and other mineral salts, in the spring-time. When properly cooked, turnips serve to sweeten the blood; but the rind particularly, and the pulp in a less degree, contain an essential volatile oil which is apt to disagree by provoking flatulent distension. The turnip root is sometimes cut up, and partly substituted for the peel and pulp of oranges in marmalade; but it is a remarkable fact that there is no starch in the composition of the turnip; seeing, therefore, that starch and sugar are absent in the root, there seems to be but little reason why turnips should not be allowed to diabetic patients. The white turnip eaten at table, though finer in flavour, is of less nutritive value than the coarser Swede. It contains scarcely any proteid elements, and "pectose" bodies make up the bulk of its carbohydrates, instead of starch. If turnips are properly grown, in dry, lean, sandy earth, a wholesome agreeable bread can be contrived from them, " of which we have eaten at the greatest persons' tables, and which is hardly to be distinguished from the best of wheat." Let the turnips be first peeled, and boiled in water till soft and tender, then strongly pressing out the juice, mix these together (after being beaten, or pounded finely) with their weight of wheat meal. Season it as you do other bread, and knead it up; then letting the dough remain a little to ferment, fashion the paste into loaves, and bake them like ordinary bread.

A nice wholesome Piedmontese dish of turnips is prepared thus: "Half boil your turnip, and cut it in slices like half-crowns; butter a pie dish, and put in the slices; moisten them with a little milk, and weak broth; sprinkle over lightly with bread crumbs, adding pepper and salt; then bake in the oven until the turnips become of a light golden colour." Horace advised field-grown turnips as preferable at a banquet to those of garden culture. Comprising these with various other vegetable productions of the kitchen garden under the name Caulis, he has pronounced :- "Caulis suburbano qui siccis crevit in agris Dulcior: irriguis nihil est elutius hortis." "Plants from dry fields those of the town excel, Nothing more tasteless is than watered soil."

Turnips may be safely eaten when raw, having been at one time in favourite use thus in Russia by the upper classes. A boiled leg of mutton with turnips was the almost daily, and much loved dish for dinner of George III. In his quaint essay on Grace before Meat, Elia has said, "A man may feel thankful, heartily thankful, over a dish of plain mutton with turnips, and give himself leisure to reflect upon the ordinance, and institution of eating these; when he shall confess a pertubation of mind inconsistent with the purposes of saying his grace before meat, on sitting down to venison, or turtle." Dr. Johnson's famous illustration of false logic bears a familiar reference to these roots: "If a man fresh Turnips cries, But cries not when his father dies, Is this a proof the man would rather Possess fresh Turnips than a father?"

The Swede is of medicinal benefit for a chronic cough; it should be cut in slices like a loaf of bread, and each slice sprinkled with brown sugar, then placing these slices again in their order, so as to reform the Swede, and allowing it to stand thus in a dish for some hours. The juice which runs therefrom is an excellent remedy for an old cough. Or again, "For a hoarsenesse, take a turnip, scoop out a hole from the top, and fill it up with brown sugar candy, and so roast it in the embers, and eat it with butter" (Rare and select Secrets in Physick and Chirurgery, 1653). The Swede, as well as the Turnip, when mashed, makes excellent cleansing and stimulating poultice for indolent sores. In Southern America turnips are never sent to table in winter without a suspicion of added sugar to restore the flavour of which the frost has deprived them. Carlyle, writing from Chelsea (1842) to E. Fitzgerald, who had been excavating the supposed actual site of the battle of Naseby, north-west of his village, Woodbridge, said, "I will ask for a tooth, or a bullet, authenticated by your own eyes, and your word of honour. And our Scotch an friend, too, making manure of it! he is part of the picture. I understand that almost all the Netherland battlefields have already given up their bones to British husbandry. Why not the old English next? Honour to thrift! If of five thousand wasted men you can make a few usable turnips, why, do it!"