Radishes--Spring and Fall Crunch

If your only experience growing radishes involved a paper cup, soil, a few seeds and a teacher’s encouraging words, or you gave up after harvesting round, red orbs that tasted like peppery plywood, you are in for a treat.

Given the right conditions, radishes are fast growing, colorful root crops that offer a range of flavors from deliciously mild and mellow to pungent and spicy.  Sliced thin and served raw, they add a crispy zing to salad, but their versatility entitles them to a place in soups, dips and in many side dishes. 

Radishes are incredibly easy to grow--they’ll perform in a pot on a sunny patio or balcony, in a windowbox or in a small row or two in the garden. Growing is the easy part.  The secret to tasty radishes is to harvest while they’re tender before hot weather settles in.  And then sow them every two weeks again starting in August for a harvest through October.