What is your favorite way to make radish soup?

[CWS4322]

Besides hotdishes, radish soup sometimes shows up at church suppers in MN. So what is your favorite radish soup recipe? Mine has chicken stock, 1/2 + 1/2 cream, white wine, green onions, radish tops (or watercress), radishes, and lavender in it.

 

[tinlizzie]

Aye Aye Aye Lucy! Never cooked a radish in my life, but I'm willing to see what you good cooks come up with. Thanks for the nudge, CWS.

 

[Sir_Loin_of_Beef]

Radish soup? Really?

 

[Dawgluver]

Intriguing! Never heard of it!

 

[CWS4322]

Here are some links to recipes for the same:

Red Radish Soup Recipe (note: the author of the book this recipe was in lives in MN)

Chinese White Radish Soup | Delicious Asian Food

Ad-Hoc Radish Soup Recipe

The Chef In My Head: Spectacular European Vacation & Creamy Radish Soup

I'm thinking of experimenting with the usual way I make it to make a cold soup...maybe swap out the 1/2 and 1/2 with greek yogurt or buttermilk, but I'd probably have to leave out the white wine....I haven't decided yet.

I toss radishes (winter and summer radishes) in stirfry all the time.

 

[Dawgluver]

Gonna hafta plant me some more radishes. Pulled the last one yesterday. Soup! Who knew?

 

[CWS4322]

I plant radishes every 10 days (I like planting a variety of colors--purple and white--I think they are called watermelon radishes, pink and white ones, icicle, and then late July I start with the winter radishes).

Here's a link to a cold radish soup using buttermilk.

Chilled Radish Buttermilk Soup Recipe at Epicurious.com

Don't forget you can eat the greens in salads or make a soup from those as well. Radishes grow so fast, but other than salad...what to do with them...I'm going to try freezing some radish soup this summer without the cream or wine added...add those after I thaw the base...

 

[blissful]

I never had cooked radishes until 10 years ago. They are great roasted, steamed, or boiled too. Add a little oil or butter, seasoning, they taste more like a turnip/potato than the hot taste you find when they are raw. I'll be trying the radish soup, thanks CWS

 

[CWS4322]

I started to notice that Asian recipes often include radishes and so stretched my mind about how to use radishes...in many places, cucumbers are also cooked. I still prefer raw cucumber...

 

[blissful]

I started to notice that Asian recipes often include radishes and so stretched my mind about how to use radishes...in many places, cucumbers are also cooked. I still prefer raw cucumber...

I think I learned about cooking radishes from an Australian cook, certainly no one around here eats them anyway except raw, soaked in salt water, and cold.
I haven't tried cooking cucumber, mostly just pickling them 11 different ways.

 

[CWS4322]

Julia Child baked cucumbers. Here's a link to her recipe:

Julia Child's Baked Cucumbers With All Variations Recipe - Food.com - 244503

 

[CWS4322]

Here's what I made:

4 c chicken broth (I made this from bones left over from grilling chicken breasts, added a fresh bay leaf and 1 T of pickling spice in a tea ball--cooked it for about 2 hours, drained it, and then put the juice in the fridge and skimmed off the fat)
1 stick butter
1/4 c flour
4 c radishes (sliced and diced)
1 leek
1 large green onion
2 c 2% milk
1/3 c white wine (1 sweetness)
2 tsp fresh lavender

What I did is sautee the radishes, onion, and leek in the melted butter. Then I added the flour, made a roux. Then I put that in the food processor and pureed it. Dumped it back into the stock pot. Then I added the chicken broth, milk, and wine. I cooked that on low for about 30 minutes. Then I added the minced lavender. I also added fresh ground pepper on top. I'm thinking it will be good cold.

How do you make your soup?

 

[CWS4322]

I forgot the watercress-about 1/4 cup added about 25 minutes in. You could use radish greens instead, mine weren't good enough.

 

[CWS4322]

Oh--and I forgot the 1/4 head (small) of green cabbage that I sauteed with the radishes, etc. I think the recipe is complete, now. I'm eating my 3rd bowl of the soup (today). Probably won't be any left to see if it is good cold..

 

[CWS4322]

I was cleaning out the fridge--there was about 2 c of the radish soup left. Being too lazy to heat it up, I chopped some fresh lavender leaves and water cress, added a dollup of greek yogurt on top of the soup, and sprinkled on the herbs. My critique is that if I wanted to eat this as a cold soup, I would use a vegetable broth instead of the chicken broth. Even though I de-greased the broth, I could still detect the chicken fat. It is also good cold...wish there was another bowl. I ate one of the whole-wheat "pretzel" kaiser rolls with it...yummy.

 

[MyCrummyApartment]

Wow. If radishes were the last thing my fridge, I still don't think I would figure I could make a soup out of them.

 

[vitauta]

imo, radishes have always been gravely underrated, underappreciated, and until recently, even underpriced, among other of their humble root vegetable peers. if i had an ounce of imagination, i would put radishes out there. i would use them in a hundred dishes in a variety of ways to showcase the uniqueness of their piquant flavorful goodness. i would explore their nature and essence. but i still don't think they would go into my soups, not cooked, anyway. doesn't cooking radishes rob them of their most special attribute - their singular pungency? then again, what do i know? i came to this thread hoping to get some fresh new ideas for how to use my little peppery friends. they could use a little good press....

 

[CWS4322]

They lose their potency when you cook them. I'm thinking I'll be making radish soup out of the ones that get too big. The soup is radish based, it doesn't have other veggies in it. I think Bliss shared that when you cook them, they are more like turnips than radishes. I'm thinking the next batch I'll make will have "radish curls" on top for garnish to maintain the peppery taste of the radish. Stretch your culinary tastes and make a small batch. You'll be surprised. I am also thinking French tarragon instead of the lavender next time. I've got a bunch of different radish varieties planted--can hardly wait to combine them in soup.Radishes grow quickly, but what to do with them besides salads and garnishes?

 

[CWS4322]

Wow. If radishes were the last thing my fridge, I still don't think I would figure I could make a soup out of them.

You stretched your mind with poutine...now I challenge you to stretch your mind when it comes to radishes <g>.

 

[blissful]

My radishes in the lasagna garden are a couple inches out of the ground. When they are ready, I'll have too many. Isn't that always the way it goes? I'll know how I like radish soup in a few weeks.