Sunchokes....not so sure

Sunchoke/Jerusalem Artichoke

Saturday's Bountiful Basket came with what looked like at first glance a bunch of ginger. Jackson wasn't sure what we were going to do with a bunch of ginger since we still have ginger from the beginning of January. But after he looked online he discovered they were Sunchokes or Jerusalem Artichokes. I have never tried one before. After doing some research of my own I discovered it is not even close to an artichoke. It is a species of sunflower!!! Crazy. So I looked up how people were preparing these odd looking little guys. That may have been my first problem. I read what people wrote about them. So I think their comments alone started to freak me out a little. It appears that these odd looking little guys may be difficult for people to digest and in turn cause a lot of.......gas. OK. I said it. I never thought I would blog about gas. But there it is. But a lot of people said they didn't get gas. And they also said if you eat small amounts you will be OK. So I decided to make a roasted vegetable salad and roast a couple Sunchokes and throw them in the salad. So I roasted some Sunchokes, yellow squash and asparagus. We made a salad of chopped romaine, garbanzo beans, green onions, chopped basil, the roasted veggies and a homemade ginger dressing. (The ginger dressing was my first attempt and I need to fine tune it before posting the recipe.)

Cut into slices, they start to discolor once cut

Roast 400 degrees for about 25 minutes

It was a yummy salad. Not gonna lie. The Sunchokes have a texture like a potato, especially after roasting. Their flavor is quite different. I thought they might be something that would grow on me. Find a few different ways to prepare them and maybe I would turn out to be a Sunchoke fan after all. Well a little later on in the day I realized that even in small doses these little odd looking guys can cause a large amount of gas. I had leftover salad that I took to work yesterday and I picked out and threw out all of the Sunchokes due to the fear that they would cause extreme gas again and I would be at work with gas and trying to hide it from my coworkers. OK. So was it all in my head? Did I sike myself out from the beginning? No, I think it was the Sunchokes. They were definitely the culprit. Now I am trying to decide what to do with the rest of them since there are a lot of them. Do we try them again and hope for the best? Or do we part ways with the Sunchoke forever? I guess time will tell. 

Roasted Vegetable Salad