The Radicchio Appreciation Thread

[Muchelle]

As requested… let’s talk about radicchio & chicory!

Here’s the main kinds of radicchio that are commonly sold + their provenience. Most common here (and cheaper) is the Chioggia one!

Then I found this other pic with radicchio & cicoria [chicory] (radicchio is technically a kind of chicory, but in common language they’re regarded as two different things over here…). Sorry for bad quality! 

As for eating… basically all of these make great additions to salads, also if they should be added in small quantities because of their bitterness. 

Radicchio quick recipes:

1. Radicchio & valerian salad + balsamic vinegar is one of my personal faves to have!
2. Radicchio is also good in panini, on pizza, or as an addition to omelettes and frittate.
3. Red radicchio can be used with speck ham to dress pasta or rice.
4. Then there’s a number of recipes that have radicchio as a filling for tortelli and tortellini or to stuff vegetables that I’m not personally familiar with, but I can find & translate if anyone wants.

Cicoria quick recipes:

Cicoria is usually seared or slow-boiled for a few minutes before adding it to any dish to get rid of the extreme bitterness. I personally can’t stand un-treated chicory, but don’t knock it till you try it

Some quick ways to eat it:

1. Eaten alone, dressed with olive oil & salt;
2. Dressing the leaves with various spices during the de-bittering process and then proceeding like #1. Common spices are salt, pepper, minced garlic, spicy pepper;
3. After de-bittering, can be added to a fava bean puree and eaten warm for a quick entrèe;
4. As stuffing for a quiche (closest thing I found to our torta salata…), possibly mixed in with cubed mortadella & cheese;
5. Mixed in with legumes to make nice soups;
6. As main ingredient for pesto instead of basil, used then to dress pasta or toasted bread;

That’s it for this first post! I don’t personally use much radicchio & cicoria in my cooking cause they’re not very used in my region, but I’m planning to experiment Do add recipes and pics of your radicchio stuff! 

[Bam]

I’ll have to try and find seeds, it says it tolerates frost. The tv show I watched was about forcing the raddichio. They waited until first frost, then replanted them and they grew new, beautiful red and white little heads in just a couple of weeks. We very rarely get it here, and I’ve only ever seen the round red with the white veins.

Cicoria Belga is called endive here. My mother always tried to make us eat it when I and my brother were kids. It was so bitter we hated it. I had no idea it could be seared. I’ll have to try that. I like vegs that I and Bam can share =)

I love pesto. This is the time of year you can pick wild garlic (ramsom) in the woods near here. It’s excellent for pesto.

[Vienna Blue in France]

Oooo, I’ve seen the red veined ones where i go and pick up the boring green endives…. i should buy some for Z&H to try

[Muchelle]

@Bam: it’s called indivia here I tried to get K to eat it once but he didn’t approve of it. The searing needs a bit of practice to remove the bitterness to exactly the perfect point, but it’s doable and makes stuff really enjoyable. I don’t know much about the cultivation of radicchio, but I know that for us it mostly comes from northern Italy (= alps), so it must be able to survive to low temps and frost!
Lol I should open an export of veg seeds XD

(pesto is love. if you add some curry powder to the normal, basil pesto it gets even better. My family pukes at the sight of me doing this but I can’t help, too good!)

[Azerane]

Bam, the endive I know here looks like this: http://juicing-for-health.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/endive01.jpg

I’ve never even seen radicchio in stores here. I suppose I could try growing some… haven’t even planted out my other seeds that I’ve had for ages though.

[Muchelle]

That’s indivia riccia (curly endive) K sort of likes it but he’s a bit meh about it. I love it in salads xD

[Q8bunny]

The ciccoria belga (aka endive here as well) is the ONLY variety we can get here. Even though Italy is only a few hours flight away. Grrrrr

[jerseygirl]

Watching this thread with interest.

I think I have Cicoria di Otranto growing! The plant my friends Nonna gave her.

I most commonly see Chioggia one, sometimes Treviso. And also Curly Endive (scarola) occasionly belgian endive and the cicoria abruzzese is just called Chicory in the stores Ive seen it in.

[jerseygirl]

Here’s the chicory flowers.

[Bam]

We have those wild chicory flowers too, they are beautiful! I thought only the root was used, for making surrogate coffee.

[Muchelle]

@Jerseygirl: I love the flowers down south at my grandparents’ home the countryside is full of them and I used to make bouquets upon bouquets with those. Cicoria abruzzese (called Catalogna in stores here) is Kuro’s fave sadly he can’t have much of it.

@Q8bunny: really? I thought in rich Middle East everything was available D: and also why endive and not the others? tsk they prefer belgians over us… lol

[Q8bunny]

My dad drinks that instead of java, Bam. It grows wild quite a bit along the Thames near my parents’ house. The flowers really are so pretty.

Muchelle: Kuwait is not so great about spending their money on things they should (or need). A lot of our imported produce doesn’t make it here in peak freshness, if you see where I’m going with this

[Tony's Mum]

I love love love raddichio, it’s on the list of veg to introduce to Tony’s diet (one new veg a week to see how he gets on). Good to have some ideas of what to do if he doesn’t like it and I end up with lots to eat myself!

[jerseygirl]

I just came across a recipe using radicchio as pizza topping. Sprinkle with oil, balsamic vinegar, salt & pepper, toss to coat radicchio. Plonk it onto pizza base and cook 10 – 15 mins. Sounds easy enough!

[Bam]

I’ve found a web shop that sells the seeds for the red chioggia!

[Muchelle]

@jersegirl: if you use a covaccino as a base instead of pizza, it comes out even better! (same dough as pizza, but thicker and smaller)

lol if anyone wants seeds I can become a dealer… *wears shady glasses and hoodie

[Starla]

I don’t personally like radicchio but I will say that one of my rabbits in particular loves loves loves radicchio! Wish it was cheaper here in Florida! Sadly I’m almost positive that Radicchio won’t grow in the hot weather that South west Florida has lol. Our winter had barely any days colder than 60 degrees F.
I have a whole little area on the side of my house with a green cover on the top of it but the rest is open (like a green house tarp). Wish I could use it for veggies like these!
Seems all that grows here is palm trees and mango trees, every place I’ve lived had both lol. I’m allergic to mango trees so the bunnies can’t even enjoy that!!. The downfalls of living less than 5 miles from Siesta Key beach :/
We do have a lot of flowers though, I never heard of chicory flowers. Do they grow in hot weather?

[Muchelle]

Italian summer goes up to 45°C and it’s full of those flowers in the countryside, so I’d say a big yes

[Blue Moon]

i didn’t even know what radicchio was until i saw this thread

[jerseygirl]

I appreciated some radicchio tonight! Like, really appreciated/enjoyed it. I roasted it and this is a style I can definitely eat it. 

I did try it as pizza topping but it was still a too bitter for me. Though I did eat it! Roasting wedges took longer and I think this helped reduce the bitterness to a nice level.

[Muchelle]

yey! If pizza-radicchio wasn’t a hit, try to dip it in egg/flour and fry it *drool* (works for sage too)

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