Best Radicchio Alternatives

1. Belgian Endive. It has a delicate appearance, and the taste is a bit bitter.
2. Curly Endive. The second alternative is curly endive which has a hearty green color.
3. Arugula. Arugula is commonly known as rocket, and it’s the edible plant that makes it a suitable alternative for radicchio.
4. Watercress.

If you don’t have radicchio on hand, endive, chicory, escarole, and arugula offer similar flavors to your dishes. Radicchio is stored like other leafy greens and will keep in the refrigerator for 2 weeks raw and unwashed.

Radicchio has a strong bitter taste with thinner and less waxy leaves than cabbage. Red cabbage has a milder taste and thicker, crunchier leaves with a more uniform purple color. You can sometimes swap one for the other in raw and cooked recipes, but the flavor will be markedly different.

Radicchio is a leafy vegetable with dark reddish-purple leaves and white veins. While radicchio is sometimes mistaken for red cabbage or lettuce, it has a distinctively tangy or bitter taste, which can add a nice contrast and crunch to salads and other dishes.

The common English names of these closely related plants is the cause of much confusion. Here, chicory is used for the green varieties of Cichorium intybus, while radicchio is used for those that display red colouration. Both heading and leaf varieties are available and are growing in popularity in Australia.

A red-hued variety of Belgian endive is known as red endive or radicchio. Radicchio is the same species as Belgian endive but has red or variegated leaves, which makes it a favorite in salads to add color and flavor.

Escarole offers a mildly bitter kick, too. It looks like lettuce, but the leaves are thicker, white at the ribs and dark green toward the softly frilled edges. Radicchio, the most colorful member of the chicory family, has a bracing bitterness and pleasing crunch.

Radicchio (/rəˈdɪkioʊ/ or /rəˈdiːkioʊ/; Italian pronunciation: [raˈdikkjo]) is a perennial cultivated form of leaf chicory (Cichorium intybus, Asteraceae) sometimes known as Italian chicory because of its common use in Italian cuisine.

Here’s how to tell the difference between radicchio and red cabbage: Radicchio is burgundy-red with white streaks. It’s light when you hold it in your hand and soft to the touch. Red Cabbage is actually more purple than red and is uniform in color.

Radicchio. Radicchio belongs to the same family as the chicory family, which is why they also taste similar to each other. However, radicchio doesn’t have the same bitterness as endives. So, if bitterness is not an issue for you, you can use radicchio instead of endive.

Names. Common chicory is also known as blue daisy, blue dandelion, blue sailors, blue weed, bunk, coffeeweed, cornflower, hendibeh, horseweed, ragged sailors, succory, wild bachelor’s buttons, and wild endive (note: “cornflower” is commonly applied to Centaurea cyanus).