It’s a root vegetable with the crisp, watery, refreshing crunch of a Granny Smith apple or possibly an Asian pear. I resembles a turnip, but is actually the root of a plant in the bean family. I wouldn’t have guessed.
I was introduced to jicama by my friend Martha Santillana Bettis maybe four decades ago. Jicama grows well in Central and throughout much of South America. I included it last night in our Shrimp cocktail. Tonight, Susan sliced some jicama disks which we then sprinkled lightly with salt, splashed with Tabasco hot sauce and then drenched in squeezed lime juice. It makes a refreshing, if Spartan palate cleanser.
The rest of the meal was grilled lamb or pork chop with smashed, rosemary peewee potatoes topped with sauteed Shiitake mushroom slices and served with a dollop of spicy chutney.
Like butter, the jicama condiments, (salt, Tabasco and lime), go well with almost anything except perhaps milk. Yeah, don’t put those in milk or cake either one.