ParsnipPastinaca sativa

The parsnip occupies its bed for almost a year, from March to February: set aside a corner you will not need, in sun or partial shade, in deep, stone-free soil, as the root goes down to thirty centimetres. It tolerates loamy and even clay soils if they are loosened deeply and drained; standing water in winter rots the crown. Like the carrot, it suffers from carrot fly: keep it away from rows of carrots and celery, and rotate over three years with all the umbellifers. Onions or leeks as neighbours protect it a little.

Loosen the bed with a broadfork to thirty centimetres, removing stones, perennial roots and hard clods, without turning the soil. Add no manure or young compost: the root would fork. Very mature compost, a shovelful per square metre, spread the previous autumn, is more than enough; the parsnip is not greedy. In clay soil, build a raised bed twenty-five centimetres high lightened with sand and leaf mould, or plan on half-long varieties, which are wider than they are deep. Rake the surface fine and leave to settle for a week before sowing.

Sow between 15 March and 15 May; a single sowing is enough, and an April sowing in soil that has already warmed up often germinates better than a March one. Buy this year's seed, as parsnip viability collapses after twelve months. Draw drills one to two centimetres deep and forty apart, drop three or four seeds every fifteen centimetres, cover with fine soil, firm and water with a spray. Sow a few radishes in the drill to mark the row. Germination takes two to four weeks of patience; the colder the soil, the longer and more uneven it is.

The parsnip is not transplanted, but its erratic germination can be tamed. Pre-sprout the seeds a week before sowing, between two sheets of damp kitchen paper in a closed box at room temperature, and sow those showing a white tip, one per station, with tweezers or between two damp fingers. After sowing, cover the drill with a plank or fleece to hold the moisture, and water every day with a fine spray in dry weather. Remove the cover as soon as the seedlings are up. If a station is still empty after a month, resow in place: until the end of May, it catches up.

The parsnip is not the first vegetable you would think of for a balcony, but it does well in a container at least forty centimetres deep, such as a half-barrel or a large grow bag, filled with two thirds potting compost and one third sand, with no fresh compost. Choose a half-long variety, sow in April in stations fifteen centimetres apart, thin to one plant, and water regularly all summer without waterlogging. The container stays outside all winter; frost improves the flavour. A dozen roots per container makes a fine store of soups for the cold months.

Sowing old seed and waiting in vain. Giving up on the drill, assuming failure after two weeks, when germination often takes three or four. Letting the surface dry out during that long germination. Sowing in manured or stony ground and harvesting three-pronged roots. Not thinning, which gives tiny roots. Letting weeds smother the slow-starting seedlings. Harvesting tasteless roots in September, when frost sweetens them. Handling the foliage with bare hands in full sun and ending up with burns. Forgetting to mark the rows before the snow.

Water matters most during germination, when the surface must stay moist at all times for three or four weeks: daily fine-spray watering in dry weather, or covering the drill. After that, the parsnip manages with its deep roots: a generous watering every ten days during a prolonged dry spell, ten litres per square metre, is enough. A normal Belgian summer calls for almost no intervention once the soil is mulched. Avoid stops and starts, which split the roots. From September, stop watering altogether: a root less full of water withstands frost better and keeps longer in the ground.

No fertiliser is of any use in well-stocked soil; excess nitrogen gives foliage and hollow roots. As soon as the foliage covers the rows, in June, mulch with five centimetres of dried grass clippings, straw or leaves, which does away with weeding and watering. In October, thicken this mulch to fifteen centimetres with dead leaves held down by fleece or branches: it is not there to protect the parsnip, which is perfectly hardy, but to stop the soil freezing solid, so that you can lift the roots in January without a pickaxe.

Thin as soon as the seedlings carry three or four leaves, to a single plant per station or every fifteen centimetres along the row, twenty for large Gladiator-type varieties. Work in the evening, pinch rather than pull, then firm and take the seedlings away. The parsnip starts slowly and suffers from competition: hoe and hand-weed every two weeks from May to June, without damaging the crowns. Harvest the marker radishes as soon as they are ready. Wear gloves and long sleeves to touch the foliage in sunny weather; its sap causes photosensitive burns.

The carrot fly attacks the parsnip too, its brown tunnels boring into the upper part of the root. Insect-proof mesh from sowing, kept on until October, remains the best defence, along with rotation and onions as neighbours. Parsnip canker, brown patches and cracks on the shoulder of the root, appears in damp soils and on exposed crowns: earth up lightly in August to cover the shoulders, choose a resistant variety, and avoid ground that stays sodden. Slugs and aphids on the foliage are harmless. Late-summer powdery mildew is cosmetic and calls for no action.

March: deep preparation of the bed, pre-sprouting of this year's seed. April: sowing in stations with marker radishes, drill covered, daily watering, insect-proof mesh. May: emergence, resowing of empty stations, first hoeing. June: thinning to one plant, hoeing, mulching as soon as the foliage covers the ground. July and August: watering only in drought, light earthing up of the shoulders against canker. September: watering stopped, mesh removed. October: first harvests after the first frosts, thickening of the mulch, marking of the rows. November to February: lifting as needed. March: harvest of everything that remains before regrowth.

Wait for the first real frosts, often in late October or November: the cold turns the starch into sugar and gives the parsnip its nutty flavour. Lift with a garden fork pushed in fifteen centimetres from the crown, in mild weather, levering gently so as not to snap the tip. Pull as needed until February: the soil under mulch is the best larder. In clay soils that become waterlogged, lift in December and store in sand. Harvest everything before mid-March, when the plant starts into growth again, as the root turns woody and hollow within a few weeks.