The Ugly Root That Earns Its Place: Jerusalem Artichokes, Honey and a Hot Oven

There is a particular moment in November when the plot goes quiet. The beans are done, the courgettes have sulked off, and what's left is a bit of kale standing about looking sturdy. And then, at a market stall or the back of a veg box, you'll find a paper bag of something that looks like it was dug up by accident: pale, lumpy, ginger-shaped roots with a bit of soil still clinging on.

Jerusalem artichokes. They don't get a lot of love. They get a lot of jokes, mostly about what happens afterwards. But the season is short, the flavour is genuinely interesting, and they cost very little. This is a small case for giving them a second look.

First, what they actually are

Not artichokes. Not from Jerusalem. The name is a long game of Chinese whispers — the plant is a North American sunflower relative, and the Italian word for sunflower, girasole, got mangled somewhere along the way. They've been grown in British gardens and allotments for centuries, which is why they have a proper old-fashioned feel about them. Sunchoke is the other name, if you see it on a label.

Flavour-wise, think of a potato that has read a book. Nutty, faintly sweet, a little like a water chestnut in texture when raw and somewhere near a floury roast potato when cooked properly. They brown beautifully, which is half the reason to bother.

The reputation, addressed honestly

Let's not pretend. Jerusalem artichokes contain inulin, a fibre that some people's digestion handles with more enthusiasm than others. It's not a reason to avoid them, but it is a reason not to serve an enormous bowl of them to six people who've never met them before, on a night when everyone's sitting close together.

In practice: cook them thoroughly, don't make them the entire meal the first time, and see how you get on. Plenty of people eat them happily and regularly. Plenty of people have one memorable evening and never go back. Both are valid. I'd rather you knew than found out over pudding.

Buying and keeping

Look for roots that feel firm and heavy for their size. Softness is the thing to avoid — softness means they're on the way out. Knobbly is fine, smooth is easier to peel, and honestly the knobbly ones often taste better. A bit of dirt on them is a good sign.

They don't store like potatoes. They go rubbery and then sad in the fridge, and unlike a potato they don't improve with a long rest. Keep them in a paper bag in the salad drawer and use them within a week or so. If you grow them, the best storage is to leave them in the ground and lift them as you need them — the frost doesn't bother them much and they'll sit there quite contentedly through the cold.

Once cut, they discolour fast. If you're prepping ahead, drop the pieces in water with a squeeze of lemon.

The case for a hot oven and late honey

This is the method I keep coming back to, and it's barely a recipe. Heat the oven to 200°C fan. Scrub the roots — peel them if you like a smoother result, but a good scrub and a trim of the knobbliest bits is perfectly acceptable and saves a lot of swearing. Cut them into rough chunks, a bit bigger than a roast potato, because they shrink.

Toss with olive oil and salt and get them into a roasting tin with space between them. Crowding is the enemy of browning. Give them twenty minutes or so, then take the tin out.

Here comes the honey, and it comes late for a reason: honey catches and burns before the roots are tender, and burnt honey tastes of regret. So drizzle a couple of spoonfuls over at this point — a runny British honey works well, something with a bit of flavour rather than the mildest jar on the shelf — toss everything about, and return the tin to the oven for another ten to fifteen minutes until the edges are dark and sticky.

Meanwhile, strip the leaves from a few stems of kale, tear them into rough pieces, and stir them through the tin for the last six or seven minutes so they crisp at the edges rather than steam.

Finish with an unseemly amount of black pepper. This is the one place I'd say go heavier than feels sensible — the sweetness of the honey needs it. A squeeze of lemon or a teaspoon of mustard whisked into the pan juices does the same job, cutting through the sugar.

How to actually serve it

Not as a penitential side dish, is my feeling. Give it a proper place on the table: a bowl of it with some bread and butter, a fried egg on top, or alongside a roast chicken with the juices spooned over. A dollop of thick yoghurt with a little salt in it works nicely too. If you're feeding people who are new to the whole enterprise, a smaller portion alongside something familiar is the kind thing to do.

The small point of all this

Jerusalem artichokes are cheap, they grow almost too easily (put them in a corner and you may never be without them again), and they turn up at exactly the moment when the kitchen needs something new. They're not a superfood. They're not a miracle. They're an awkward, knobbly root with a good nutty flavour and a bit of a reputation, and a hot oven and a spoon of honey flatter them enormously.

Next time you see a bag of them looking unloved at the market, take them home. Give them twenty-five minutes and a lot of pepper. That's the whole ask.