Welcome to the summary page for FabulousFusionFood's Spice guide to Horseradish along with all the Horseradish containing recipes presented on this site, with 35 recipes in total.

This is a continuation of an entire series of pages that will, I hope, allow my visitors to better navigate this site. As well as displaying recipes by name, country and region of origin I am now planning a whole series of pages where recipes can be located by meal type and main ingredient. This page gives a listing of all the spice-based recipes added to this site.

These recipes, all contain Horseradish as a major flavouring.

Horseradish, Armoracia rusticana, syn Cochlearia armoracia is a perennial member of the Brassicaceae (mustard or cabbage) family. It grows up to 1.5 m tall and is mainly cultivated for its large white, tapering root, although the leaves are also edible.

Its root is used as a vegetable or ground in a condiment called prepared horseradish, and has at times been used as the bitter herbs in the Passover meal in some Jewish communities. Horseradish, sometimes blended with cream and called horseradish sauce, is often served with roast or boiled beef or sausages, as well as smoked fish. Horseradish is also used in some prepared mustards. Also, much of what is styled wasabi is actually common horseradish dyed green.

The horseradish root itself has hardly any aroma in its intact state. When cut or grated, however, enzymes from the damaged plant cells break down sinigrin (a glucosinolate) to produce allyl isothiocyanate (mustard oil), which irritates the sinuses and eyes and it is this pungency that qualifies horseradish as a spice. Once grated, if not used immediately or mixed in vinegar, the root darkens and loses its pungency and becomes unpleasantly bitter when exposed to air and heat. In recent years horseradish has gained something of a renaissance and horseradish root can now be found in most supermarkets.

It is easy to propagate both from seed and bought roots, but note that if you want to plant in your own garden it is very invasive and is best grown in a small raised bed. Traditionally horseradish is harvested after the first frosts of autumn kills the leaves. The root is dug up and divided with the main root being harvested and one or more of the larger offshoots being re-planted to provide the following year's crop.

Intact horseradish root does not exhibit much aroma, but on cutting, shredding and especially grating, a pungent and lachrymatory, very strong odour is released. This odour is, however, not stable but vanishes after some ten or twenty minutes. Horseradish root contains approx. 0.6% of glucosinolates; the most abundant of these are sinigrin (0.2%) and gluconasturtiin (0.1%). As soon as intact cells are damaged, these isothiocyanates are enzymatically hydrolyzed to yield allyl isothiocyanate and 2-phenylethyl isothiocyanate, respectively. See black mustard for biochemical details. Further glucosinolates in horseradish are glucobrassicanapin and the indol-derived glucobrassicin (plus some closely related compounds like 4-methoxy glucobrassicin, 4-hydroxy glucobrassicin). On hydrolysis, glucobrassicanapin yields 4-pentenyl isothiocyanate; yet the glucobrassicines have no corresponding stable isothiocyanates. Instead, they hydrolyze to 3-hydroxyindole derivatives and free isothiocyanate ions. Among the non-volatile constituents, one should mention flavone glycosides (quercetine, kaempferol) and particularly ascorbic acid, which is contained to 06% in horseradish root.

The plant is thought to be of Mediterranean or Eastern European origin, and is now widely cultivated in Central and Eastern Europe. It is commonly found "wild", this is, escaped from cultivation. As the pungent allyl isothiocyanate is not heat resistant; therefore, horseradish is only seldom used for warm foods and then added immediately before serving. Even in cold water, allyl isothiocyanate is not stable for longer than a few minutes. However, in sour environment the hydrolysis of thiocyanates takes place much more slowly.