Radishes, Seed to Plate!

Radishes. They have seeds just bit enough for little fingers to plant easily, they germinate quickly (to kids' delight), and in just weeks you get a crop of delightfully pink roots! However, 100% of children, and I am basing that extreeeemely scientifically on the three out of three of my children that have tasted radishes on a number of occasions, don't like them. Boo I say. 

All three of them this year planted some radishes: Squidge intentionally so in a hanging basket, Sprout also intentionally in a big planter with some peas and runner beans, and Moppet less intentionally when she spilt some in with her cut and come again lettuce hanging basket. They did their usual sterling job of growing at speed, and one afternoon this week Squidge decided that he wanted to pick, cook and eat them RIGHT NOW. Awesome. Can you cook radishes though? No clue, it had literally never occurred to me, so with Google as my little knowledge-magpie I found this little recipe http://m.allrecipes.com/recipe/76120/grilled-radishes and so it was a big yes!

We headed outside to do the radish harvest. Here's one of the crop...

Squidge took the lead...

...ably backed up by Moppet patrolling the hanging baskets (I'd lifted these down obviously, what would be the point of veg in hanging baskets if we kept them at slug height???)

And behold! The first radish harvest of 2014 :) 

It was at this point that Squidge's friend did their secret call over the fence and shouted to see if he wanted to go and play, and the reply, "No thanks, I'm cooking radishes! You want to help?" was uttered, maybe for the first time ever anywhere, but certainly for the first time in our street ;)

And so we gained a radish-cooking helper.

Squidge and his friend gave them a good wash, and then he topped and tailed them, and then sliced them quite thinly, explaining to his friend as he did so that if you keep the end of the big knife on the board as you chop, it keeps the knife steady. Love him!

Then we showed his friend how to squish garlic cloves under a big knife blade (ha! Far safer than it sounds when I type it out.) and added those to the radishes with a knob of butter and some salt and pepper. His friend added an ice cube while eying me like I might have gone a little bit mad ("An ice cube? In the cooking?") and then Squidge parcelled the whole lot up in foil and I put it under the grill for about twenty minutes.

And the end result! Looks the same, but an entirely different eating experience, enjoyed, it turns out, by 66% of ALL CHILDREN* 

*previous scientific method of extrapolation applies

And I couldn't do a radish post without my favourite *ever* radish joke.

What's small, pink and whispers?

A hoarse radish!