From the book All Around the House, 1879

Chicory, "succory," or "wild endive," although it grows wild in our country, is much cultivated abroad. The leaves, unblanched, are bitter, but, soaked some hours in water, the bitter property disappears, and it is used as a salad. When blanched it ranks, with some, among the best winter or spring salads. It is easily raised, and by packing the roots in a trench close together in the fall, and in the early spring laying on some earth well mixed with manure, the young leaves will push out finely blanched, forming a very crisp early salad, much superior, we are told, to the early tough green lettuces. Its growth is rapid, and it can be cut several times in the year; or the roots may be laid in a warm cellar in the fall, away from frost, and the tender leaves will shoot out, nicely blanched, for an excellent winter salad. In Belgium and the Netherlands the roots are scraped, boiled, and used like parsnips.