Plant
Turnip
Brassica rapa subsp. rapa
Also known as: Brassica rapa subsp. rapa, white turnip, neep, kabu
A cool-season biennial root crop in the cabbage family, domesticated independently in Europe and East Asia from wild *Brassica rapa*. Predates the potato in Northern European agriculture and was the primary winter root staple of Britain, Scandinavia, the Low Countries, and Ireland for centuries — *Halloween* jack-o-lanterns were originally carved from turnips and swedes, not pumpkins. Across East Asia, *kabu* turnips are pickled (*senmaizuke*, *kabu no asazuke*) and stewed; Japanese, Korean, and Chinese cuisines all feature distinct cultivars. Greens (turnip tops) are a separate culinary tradition, central to Southern U.S. and Italian cooking.
Scientific
Brassica rapa subsp. rapa is the turnip cultivar group within the polymorphic species Brassica rapa, family Brassicaceae. The same species in other subspecies gives rise to Chinese cabbage (pekinensis), bok choy (chinensis), mizuna, tatsoi, and the oilseed brown sarson. The turnip cultivar group has been selected for a swollen hypocotyl-root storage organ that ranges from spherical white-and-purple (the classic European market turnip) through long white Japanese Hinona kabu to large purple Korean baechu mu types. Biennial: stores carbohydrate in the root in year one, bolts and flowers in year two.
Cool-season crop: germinates and grows best at 10–18°C, becomes pithy and bitter in heat. Short growing season — many cultivars are harvested 6–8 weeks from sowing — makes turnip a flexible succession and cover crop.
Cultural
Turnips are one of the most archaeologically deep European staple foods, cultivated since at least the Bronze Age and probably earlier. Pre-potato Northern European peasant agriculture relied on turnips and the related Brassica napus swede (rutabaga) for winter carbohydrate — when stored in clamps or root cellars, turnips kept reliably from autumn harvest through spring. The introduction of potato to Northern Europe in the 17th–18th centuries displaced turnip from the central staple role, but it remained important as a livestock fodder and human food.
The pre-pumpkin Celtic Halloween jack-o-lantern was carved from a large turnip or swede in Ireland and Scotland; Irish emigrants encountered the much-easier-to-carve pumpkin in North America and adopted it, returning the new tradition back across the Atlantic.
In East Asia, kabu turnips have a distinct culinary identity: pickled into Kyoto senmaizuke (the famously paper-thin Kyoto turnip pickle made from Shōgoin kabu), stewed in dashi, simmered in winter soups. Korean and Chinese cuisines have their own cultivar lineages and preparations.
Turnip greens are a separate culinary category. Southern U.S. soul food cooks turnip greens long with smoked pork; Italian cime di rapa (broccoli rabe / rapini, a turnip-greens cultivar selected for the flower buds rather than the root) is a defining vegetable of Puglian cuisine; Galician grelos and Portuguese grelos fill the same role on the Iberian peninsula.
Global production
China is the largest producer; major production in India, Russia, Poland, the UK, the United States, and Japan. Most production is for fresh-market human consumption; significant smaller volumes for livestock fodder, especially in the UK and Northern Europe.
See also
Auto-generated from this entry’s typed relations: frontmatter, grouped by relation type so the editorial signal isn’t flattened.
- Shares approach with: [[cabbage]] · [[daikon]] · [[beet]]
- Member of: [[plants]]
Sources
- USDA Agricultural Research Service — Brassica rapa genetics
- FAO commodity statistics
- Wikipedia — Turnip
A plant entry in the 0mn1.one [[directory]].
What links here, and how
Inbound connections from across the wiki, grouped by lens and by relationship. These appear automatically — every entity page declares what it links to, and that data populates here on the targets.
Scientific
shares approach with
- Radish fellow Brassicaceae root crop; radish is Raphanus, turnip Brassica — different genera, similar agronomic niches
1 inbound link · 4 outbound