Rutabagas, raw

Rutabagas are a cross between cabbage and turnip, with a dense, waxy purple-and-cream skin and firm yellow flesh that tastes sweeter and less peppery than a turnip once cooked. They are peeled, cut into cubes, and boiled or roasted until tender, then mashed on their own or blended with potatoes and butter, added to beef stews and pot roasts, or cut into fries and roasted until browned at the edges. Raw, the flesh is crisp enough to shave thin into a slaw, though most cooks reach for it as a cooked root vegetable rather than a raw one.

Choose rutabagas that feel heavy and firm for their size with smooth, unblemished skin, and store them unwaxed in the refrigerator crisper, where they keep for several weeks, longer than more delicate vegetables. A one-cup serving of cubes (140 grams) has 37 calories, making rutabaga a low-calorie way to add volume and heft to a stew or mash in place of some of the potatoes. It also provides vitamin C at 28% of the Daily Value per 100 grams, and with 4.46 grams of sugar and 8.62 grams of carbohydrate per cup, it reads as a mild, subtly sweet vegetable rather than a starchy one.