How do you cook it?

It was some kind of radish. I knew one type of radish prior to that day. The radish I knew was a small, round or cylindrical, red vegetable cultivated by newbie gardeners everywhere because it's so easy to grow (apparently). This was not that kind of radish. This one was huge. Giant! I had no idea what I was going to do with it. 

So, naturally, I bought it.

But I was sure to get some how-to-use instructions first. No need to cook it at all it turns out (despite its ginormous size). Great with salads, I was told. And it was, but it lasted for weeks and there's only so many salads a person can eat.

I do this often, I must point out. The buying unfamiliar veggies bit, though the salads bit, too, if I'm honest. It's one of the great things of moving country - finding 'weird' fruit and vegetables you haven't seen before. Weird really isn't the right word. There's nothing strange about them; I had simply never crossed paths with them during my (obviously sheltered) upbringing. If anything, I was the weird one!

In Spain I did it all the time. 'What's a kaki?' (now one of my favourite cool weather fruits) or 'that's an artichoke? What do I do with it?' And then later in Australia: 'DRAGON fruit??'

Saying I always understand the cooking or eating advice I receive(d) would be lying. But I ask all the same. We do that living abroad, don't we? Ask a question knowing with some confidence that we won't catch the reply. Nothing that a well-timed 'aaaaaahhhhh, I seeeeee' won't get us out of!

Words from the text

prior to before

newbie beginner
turn out (phrasal verb) result in 
ginormous an informal word meaning very big; like enormous but bigger
cross paths with meet
a sheltered upbringing a protected childhood that results in the adult being quite naïve 
get us out of save us from, enable us to avoid or escape

Using 'apparently'

A useful little word, this one is used a lot when you have information but are not 100% sure the information is accurate or true, perhaps because it's secondhand information or you're not convinced that you can trust the source: something an unreliable colleague told you, info from a trashy magazine or newspaper or something you overheard.

'Apparently he bought 16 large radishes and 3 kilos of cherimoya. At least that's what I heard. I wasn't actually there.'

Photo by he zhu on Unsplash