SC - Re: turnips

[Mark Schuldenfrei]

  Hmmmm. Certainly that would work quite well for bulk-sized presentations
  (i.e. events). It might be interesting to experiment with some other
  Italian cheeses, since the recipe specifies something like "a rich
  cheese, aged not too long" or some such. To me this implies something in
  between mozzarella and cheddar with regard to sale age. Taleggio,
  perhaps, which is an Italian variant on Brie? I also assume the type of
  cheese isn't critical, or it would have been specified.

It appears to me that, in all honesty, the flavor of the spices and the
cheese overwhelms the vegetable flavor, and the turnip provides mostly
crunch and texture.  The mildly spicy flavor of the turnip surfaces late,
and overrides the greasy taste of melted cheese.  In that sense, I agree:
any cheese that does not have an overwhelming flavor of its own would be
ideal.  Exceptions being things like blue, limburger, smoked cheeses.
  
  Another aspect I was curious about: I've never seen precooked and diced
  frozen turnips, at least not the white turnip I believe the recipe calls
  for. I have seen frozen rutabega in various forms. Forgive this current
  tendency toward existentialism, but we aren't talking about rutabegas,
  are we? I assume they would work fairly well for most criteria, but... 

The bags are clearly labelled turnips.  They do, however, contain orange
rutebega.  I have, rarely, seen frozen diced turnips qua turnips.

May I be honest?  While most of the time I am an authenticity nutcase on
food issues, I don't know why I don't seem to care much on this one.  Maybe
because I think they taste quite similarly.  And that most people don't know
the difference.  (And, depending upon where you are in the world, and when,
they are called different things, as Adamantius knows from discussions on
rec.food.historic)  Heck, I bet daikon would work in the recipe.  (But not
potatoes.  We went over that.)

De Rutebagae non Disputandum son.  (:-)  Or something very like that.
  
  Interesting link here, BTW, between this dish and the various cheesy
  gratins traditional in the south of France even today. I had mentioned
  them in connection with Swiss chard, IIRC.

Indeed. If I could eat them, I would try them.

	Tibor