I’m a city girl who slowly started experimenting with urban gardening, eventually transitioning (through much trial and error) to growing crops on a rural farm over several decades. I have always thrown the tops of my root veggies right into the compost bin. Earlier this summer, my French friend Patrick mentioned eating carrot fronds in a discussion about the culinary value of radish greens. I cooked the radish greens and I saved the tender carrot fronds when I thinned the first planting in my vegetable garden. After washing the bright green parsley–like leaves I tossed them into the food processor with a clove of garlic, a dash of salt, a squeeze of lemon, olive oil and a few pine nuts. Voilà — a delicious pesto! I’ve repeated the process several times, loving the unique flavor that hints of carrots, that is so easy and versatile. It works as a dip, spread, pasta sauce, and topping for roasted carrots. I’ve grown more accustomed to enjoying the top and side parts of veggies I previously thought of as waste, as my kitchen gardening has expanded in this exceptional season. I made pickled garlic scapes that are nice in salads and fun in a Martini or Bloody Mary. I recently discovered that the spines of chard, beet tops and kale are great on the grill with a garlic-oil drizzle.
At about the same time as I was delighting in the carrot fronds, my onions were getting ready to be harvested. A Google ”how-to” search serendipitously located GardenBetty.com where I found the answers to all my questions, plus a link to the author, Linda Ly’s newest book, The No-Waste Vegetable Cookbook, Recipes and Techniques for Whole Plant Cooking. As a self-taught gardener and cook used to trial and error, I don’t generally seek in-depth information or follow recipes too carefully. But my interest was piqued by my recent small successes with radish and carrot by-products. Too much effort was going into tending of this year’s garden not to find out more about preserving and using my produce. Linda Ly’s wonderful book feels like it was written for me. The book includes a recipe for Carrot Top Salsa! I was hooked by the author’s words “I’ve always considered cooking as an art, rather than an exact science.” With exquisite photographs by her husband, Will Taylor, and straightforward recipes, the book is about finding flavor in unexpected places. Every part of the plant, even the scraps, imparts a different flavor and texture to a dish. The book is not a manifesto on food waste, but about the joy of using the whole vegetable in everyday cooking.
The author, whose parents lived through war-era Vietnam, comes from a culture where food is a celebration of life. As I write, I am looking at a half watermelon rind in my compost bucket, and anxious to retrieve it for Watermelon Rind Pickles. The chard stems that regularly go into the same bucket will become Chard Stem Hummus, a dish the author says is as common in Lebanon as chickpea hummus. The kale stems will be saved for Kale Pesto. And finally I have a plan for the mammoth fennel fronds that were purely decorative until now, but are destined to be delicious in a Ginger Fennel Pesto.
Linda Ly wrote in the preface that many of her “friends didn’t know that you could eat radish tops, let alone carrot tops.” I have to admit that I, and many of my foodie friends, still don’t. I’m not completely convinced that Tomato Leaf Pesto will be a big success, but I’m eager to try it and thrilled to be educated on ‘top-to-tail’ cooking. Linda’s most memorable meals have not been prepared in the many places to which she has traveled, but from her own kitchen and garden, simple and fresh, inventive and inexpensive. This is a sentiment many of us share and can find particularly comforting at this moment. 
Spicy Fermented Summer Salsa
Used by permission from The No-Waste Vegetable Cookbook : Recipes and Techniques for Whole Plant Cooking by Linda Ly from Harvard Common Press.
Why fermented salsa? Why not normal salsa like you’ve always made? I’ve used this same recipe for nonfermented salsa and it ’s fine—great, actually—but fermentation pushes it over the line to fantastic.
The same bacteria and yeasts that give sauerkraut and kimchi their distinctive flavor also give this salsa a bright and tangy note. And, those same bacteria and yeasts are what make this salsa so good for your gut. It’s an easy way to get fermented foods in your diet if you’re not keen on kraut; the salsa is lively on the taste buds without being too sour or too salty.
Ingredients
- •1 1/2 pounds (680 g) tomatoes, cut into small dice
- •1/2 red onion, cut into small dice
- •1/2 to 1 jalapeno pepper, minced (some jalapenos are hotter than others, so do a taste test before putting the whole thing in there)
- •1/2 serrano pepper, minced
- •5 garlic cloves, minced
- •1/2 cup (8 g) chopped cilantro
- •1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
- •1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
- •Juice of 1 lime
- •Olive oil for topping
Preparation
In a medium bowl, combine all the ingredients (except the oil). Pour the salsa into a quart jar (946 ml) and run a knife around the sides of the jar to release any trapped air bubbles.
Add a 1/2-inch (1.3 cm) layer of oil on top. The oil serves two purposes: It prevents the vegetables from rising above the liquid and growing mold on the surface, and it adds a richness to the salsa once you mix it in.
Loosely seal the jar with a lid and let it stand at room temperature, out of direct sunlight, for a few days. The warmer your room temperature is, the faster your salsa will ferment. You’ll begin to see bubbles in the jar as the lactic acid bacteria flourish. Taste the salsa after 3 to 4 days; if it hasn’t developed a bold, tangy flavor yet, leave it out for up to 1 week. The longer you let it ferment, the more intense the flavor will become, and the longer the salsa will keep (since the bacteria are a natural preservative). Refrigerate once the salsa reaches peak flavor. The oil may congeal in the cold temperature, but it is still safe to eat. Bring the salsa to room temperature and stir in the oil before serving.
Quick-Pickled Sweet ‘N’ Spicy Radish Pods
Used by permission from The No-Waste Vegetable Cookbook : Recipes and Techniques for Whole Plant Cooking by Linda Ly from Harvard Common Press.
Unless you grow your own radish plants at home, you’ve likely never seen the long, thin seed pods that emerge once they start flowering. All radish plants produce seed pods that are edible; you may have even come across a patch of wild radishes on a hike and not realized what the pointy-tailed pods were. They appear en masse (a single plant is quite prolific, producing dozens of pods on its flower stalk) at the end of the life cycle, long after the radish root has turned woody and inedible. But even though you can’t harvest the radish, consider the seed pods a bonus harvest—a final hurrah—before you pull the plant up.
Pick them while they’re green and fresh (because in a few weeks, they’ll dry out and turn into actual seeds). The crunchy, peppery pods taste like a concentrated radish and can be easily snack ed on by the handful.
Though I like them when they’re raw, I love them even more when they’re pickled. The sweet and tangy brine mellows out their spice somewhat and turns the radish pods into a zesty topping for sandwiches, tacos, Pea Shoot Salad with Radish and Carrot, Bottom-of- the-Box Bibimbap, or even a Bloody Mary.
Ingredients
- •1 cup (235 ml) water
- •½ cup (120 ml) rice vinegar
- •½ cup (120 ml) white wine vinegar
- •½ cup (100 g) sugar
- •½ tablespoon kosher salt
- •2 heaping (150 g) cups radish seed pods
Preparation
In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine the water, rice vinegar, wine vinegar, sugar, and salt and stir until the grains are dissolved. Let the brine cool to room temperature.
Pack the radish pods into jars and pour the brine over them, making sure the pods are fully submerged. Pickle at room temperature, out of direct sunlight, for at least 4 hours before serving. For best flavor, pickle overnight in the fridge.
Savory Sweet Potato Hummus
Used by permission from The No-Waste Vegetable Cookbook : Recipes and Techniques for Whole Plant Cooking by Linda Ly from Harvard Common Press.
While sweet potatoes are generally associated with sweet flavors, this savory and spicy hummus will have you thinking about them in new ways. A blend of tender sweet potatoes and smoky spices changes up the usual hummus routine of garlic and tahini (and gives it a brilliant orange color). It makes an addictive dip for flatbread, pita chips, carrot sticks, celery nubs, and the list goes on. I’ll sometimes smear it onto a Mediterranean- style wrap with roasted vegetables; the creaminess eliminates the need for a messy sauce.
Ingredients
- •1 pound (455 g) sweet potatoes, cut into 1-inch (2.5 cm) cubes
- •1 can (15 ounces, or 425 g) of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
- •4 garlic cloves
- •¼ cup (60 ml) olive oil, plus more for serving
- •1 teaspoon ground cayenne pepper
- •1 teaspoon ground cumin
- •½ teaspoon kosher salt
- •Zest of 1 lemon
- •Juice of ½ lemon
- •Smoked paprika for serving
Preparation
Bring a large saucepan of water to a boil. Add the sweet potatoes and boil until very soft, about 10 minutes. Drain, reserving about ½ cup (120 ml) of the water, and let cool.
Add the remaining ingredients (except the smoked paprika) to a food processor and pulse continuously until smooth. If you’re sensitive to spice, I suggest starting with only ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper and adding more to taste. As your mixture transforms into creamy hummus, you can add some of the reserved sweet potato water (1 tablespoon [15 ml] at a time) if you prefer a looser consistency. Serve with a generous swirl of oil on top and a dusting of smoked paprika.