Ingredient guide: Root vegetables

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Versatile, easy to prepare and delicious in everything from roasts to salads, root vegetables are an essential in many winter dishes.

As long ago as 2000 BC, temple drawings from Egypt show a plant believed to be a purple carrot. It is also identified in the garden of the Egyptian King Merodach-baladan in the eighth century BC. Orange roots, containing the pigment carotene, were not noted until the 16th century in Holland. This only came about thanks to patriotic Dutch farmers who bred the vegetable to grow in the colours of the House of Orange. Full of vitamins and minerals, carrots contain vitamin A, which promotes the improvement of eyesight. The saying ‘carrots will help you see’ is therefore not far from the truth.

Buying and storing

Beetroots: Beetroots are available all year round with the peak season being early winter to late spring. Beetroot bulbs can be stored in the crisper section of the fridge for up to two weeks. The leaves can be stored and used within three days.

Carrots: Carrots are available year round. Store in a plastic bag in the crisper section of the fridge for up to one week. Don’t store near apples, as the ethylene gas emitted by apples gives carrots a bitter taste. Remove the tops of baby (Dutch) carrots before storing.

Parsnips: Available all year, parsnips are at their best from April to October. Look for medium-sized varieties; larger parsnips will have a woodier, inedible core. Store in a plastic bag in the crisper section of the fridge for up to one week.

Turnips: Store in a plastic bag in the crisper section of the fridge for up to one week.

Swedes: Store in a plastic bag in the crisper section of the fridge for up to three weeks.

Sweet potatoes: Store in a cool, dark, dry and well-ventilated area for up to three weeks.

Celeriac: Celeriac can become hollow and stringy with age, so choose those that are firm and heavy for their size (this indicates a solid centre). Store in the fridge for up to one week.
Radish: Cut off the leaves and store in a plastic bag in the crisper section of the fridge for up to one week.

Tips & facts

• Radishes are believed to possess medicinal properties, and have been used as an alternative treatment for whooping cough, gastric problems, kidney stones and liver ailments. 
• The famous Scottish dish, bashed neeps, is made of boiled swedes mashed with butter. It is a traditional accompaniment to haggis.
• Beetroot evolved from wild seabeet, native to coastlines from India to Britain. Beetroot originally had a carrot-shaped root and only the leaves were eaten (the small root was used for medicinal purposes by ancient Greeks and Romans).
• Celeriac is derived from wild celery, which has a small, edible root and has been used in Europe since ancient times (it is mentioned in Homer’s Odyssey as ‘selinon’).
• The New Zealand Maori gave the orange sweet potato we know as kumara its name.

Recipes & food preparation: Sarah Hobbs. Photography: Steve Brown. Styling: Michelle Noerianto.