Piles of Parsnips

In addition to all the exciting creature additions this week, we also had a major harvest of parsnips:

That five-gallon bucket is overflowing, and that's just half of the harvest. 

Parsnips are at their best after a couple frosts to sweeten them up, and normally we keep them heavily mulched to dig out a bunch on warm winter day. That way we can have them throughout the winter without worrying about storing them inside. 

We may have to rethink that plan after this winter, though. For two months we couldn't get anywhere near them, as they were buried under six feet of snow. Perhaps this fall we'll try processing some to freeze in a puree or store them whole in a bucket of sand in the basement so that we have access to some blizzard food.

For now, we're stuck with a whole winter's worth of parsnips (which, as Murphy's Law would have it, did better than ever before). We gave some away to our friendly neighborhood beekeepers and got started with some curried parsnip soup:

This easy soup is made by pureeing roasted parsnips and adding chicken stock to thin the puree to a soup-appropriate consistency. Kirk seasoned it with a healthy dose of curry powder, salt, pepper, and a bit of cayenne. The secret ingredient is a squeeze of lime juice into each bowl. The acidity of the lime plus the heat of the cayenne and curry helps balance out the (really almost too sweet) sweetness of the parsnips. 

This is just day one of our Parsnip Spring, so I'm sure I'll be sharing more recipes in the near future. In the meantime, if you have a favorite way to eat parsnips (other than just plain roasting, which is already my favorite), please share in the comments!