Kibkom North Cyprus Forum

Does anyone know if you can get swede here?

Sorry never seen them here, but they have them in the South, Alphamega.

Frozen swede was available in Supreme in Catalkoy. Often the ones in the south are a bit ropey!!!

I may be confusing Swede and Turnip, but isn't there a local vegetable that's a pretty near substitute?

Are you talking about kolokas? I wouldn't say it's like either swede or turnip.

I don't know!

The vegetable closest to swede/turnip is called beyaz sarmak (white bandage/wrap) in Turkish (if memory serves me). Can't for the life of me remember what it is called in English. It's difficult to describe. You can boil it, if you like it orange add some carrot and mash it up together. Will post again when I remember what it's English name is - seem to think it's Israeli.

Just remembered - it's Kohlrabi aka German Turnip. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohlrabi

Hate Swede and Turnip and Kohlrabi is even worse!!!!

Ahhh...Kohlrabi is sooo lovely and it grows so well here in the winter. not a bad substitute for swede, more refined taste, so I do like swede too, learned that in England, in Germany it's just for the cows

Oh God the poor cows in Germany, that's all I can say!!

I'm not sure if it's swede or turnip that I'm thinking of, but my preference is to have it mashed with carrot and butter, pepper, and whisky...

Failing that, just hand me the glass...

I get confused too but that's because I came from a bicultural family (Mum was Scottish, Dad was English) so I don't know if it's a Scottish thing but I call the orange one turnip and the white one new turnip. We have the orange one mashed with butter and loads of pepper (neeps) with haggis and mashed potato - yum yum.

My Belgian grandmother always regarded the British with disdain because of their love for root vegetables which she only ever fed to her pigs on the farm.

I LOVE swede mashed with lots of butter and black pepper; not keen on turnips though.

My daughter has a small holding in Scotland. Numerous swedes growing. We used to dig them up & feed them to the pigs.
How I wish I could get my hands on some of those now. Love them mashed with butter & black pepper.
The swedes & rhubarb are two of the things I miss the most.

I really miss rhubarb too; I found some bags of frozen rhubarb in Supreme the other day. I couldn't decide between rhubarb pie or crumble, so made a rhubarb crumble pie. It was delicious!

We successfully grew some swede here earlier this year (March/April) and have another batch growing now. They grew very quickly and seemed fine; they were just given away to friends to try. Also Jackie from Lambousa used some in her Cornish Pasties and was very happy with them. This lot we were thinking of offering to Ileli to sell.

We also have parsnips and rhubarb on the go - both failed earlier but we are trying now in the cooler weather so maybe they will be available eventually. I hold out more hope for the rhubarb than the parsnips but only when we get some shade erected to keep the summer sun off the plants which was what killed them earlier. The parsnips didn't really take off but even if we get them going there remains the problem that they need a good frost to bring out the true flavour.

I mash my swede with chopped bacon and cream and lots of black pepper- and if there is any left then I make it into patties and fry it in butter for breakfast the next morning.

Let me know when you have swede and rhubarb; i'll gladly buy some from you.

Hi JBA, I was told that with rhubarb you need to put in the freezer over night before planting, this I am told fools it in thinking there has been a frost. Hope someone was not just having a laugh at my expense!

We have no problem getting rhubarb going - it's keeping it going when the really hot weather sets in. We will thoroughly shade it this year and if that doesn't work then we'll keep it in the dark and try for forced rhubarb.

dippersgirl wrote:Ahhh...Kohlrabi is sooo lovely and it grows so well here in the winter. not a bad substitute for swede, more refined taste, so I do like swede too, learned that in England, in Germany it's just for the cows

People eat Kohlrabi here in Germany. And they are very welcome to it, it's horrible!

Really miss Swede and Carrot, mashed together with butter, salt and pepper.

Swede was available in Alpha Mega today