Pardailhan black turnip ✦

Navet noir de Pardailhan

What it is

Pardailhan sits at 500 metres in the Hérault, and its black turnip took medals at nineteenth-century exhibitions and shipped some 500 tonnes a year in the 1910s before rural exodus after the war nearly ended it. Nineteen growers rebuilt it through the association Lou Nap del Pardailha in 1993, and Slow Food made it a Presidium in 2003.

In the kitchen

Do not blanch it: removing sulphur is what blanching is for, and this turnip has none. Peel, halve lengthwise and roast in duck fat at 180 °C until the cut face caramelises, which the dense flesh will take 40 minutes to do.

Goes with

Duck fat Butter Honey Hazelnut Pork Thyme Duck confit

Same species

Baek-kimchi Broccoli Brussels sprout Cabbage Cauliflower Cavolo nero

In season alongside

Butternut squash Jerusalem artichoke Kabocha Parsnip Hedgehog mushroom Red kuri squash

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