Pickled Beets, 2015

Full disclosure: this recipe is 100% not our own. The reason? Every year, I forget from which source I located the pickled beets recipe because I have never blogged about pickling beets. I go searching online, browsing through other cookbooks....only to just choose something random and different each and every year. So, I'm shamelessly blogging about a recipe I found in a cookbook.

And ... the beets in this cookbook are wonderful! Slightly sweet, tangy, and perfectly pickled, this is my favorite recipe for pickled beets thus far. At this pint, I fully endorse The Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving. Granted, this is the only recipe from the book that I've seen to fruition, but I bought this gem only a month ago. I love that the cookbook focuses on small batches because, let's be realistic, I live with only one other human: we can only consume so much food. 

Anyway, try this pickled beets recipe! We used chioggia beets and golden beets, hence the interesting colors in the jars. We also a little more than doubled this, so we ended up with 4.5 quarts

Easy Spiced Pickled Beets (makes 4 pints)

8-15 pounds of fresh beets

2 cups sugar

2 cups white vinegar

1/3 cup water

16 whole cloves

8 whole allspice berries

2 cinnamon sticks, about 4 inches long

2 tsp pickling salt

1. Trim beets, leaving 1 inch of stem and taproot attached. Put in pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil, and then turn down heat, cover, and simmer for 25 to 45 minutes. Be careful not to overcook them! Cook just until tender..... 

Once tender, drain and rinse with cold water. Remove skins and cut beets into desired size pieces. If you have chickens, be sure to save the scraps! They loved them....

Chicken treats or compost ingredients?

2. Combine sugar, vinegar, and water in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat. Stir occasionally. 

3. In sanitized, hot jars, place 4 cloves, 2 allspice berries, and 1/2 cinnamon stick in each jar. Pack beats into jar. Pour hot liquid over beets to within 1/2 inch of rim. 

4. Process 30 minutes for 2-cup jars and 35 minutes for 4-cup jars. 

Thanksgiving Favorites, 2011

We were lazy this Thanksgiving. The appetizer we shared with our families involved zero preparation. We simply opened jars, did a bit of slicing and dicing, and viola - complete!  As the holidays approached, we realized we had done a lot of pickling and fermenting this summer. We decided to share a platter of salty, sweet, bitter, and sour flavors. And so, this year, we are especially thankful for healthy, organic produce and for the steamy summer nights we dealt with it all over gigantic cups of iced coffees. Those memories are ones we'll never forget because there really is nothing as romantic as two sweaty adults in a closet-sized kitchen with water canners heating up the already 90+ degree house. Thankful, we are.

Our pickle tray consisted of:
balsamic onions
sour pickles
spicy sliced carrots
dill rat-tail radishes
sweet pepper marmalade served with cream cheese and crackers
pickled spring garlic

On Thanksgiving day, while the Packers won their 11th game this season, some braver family members filled snack plates with pickles. During Lappsgiving (what we've begun to affectionately call our second Thanksgiving), we chatted while delighting in these finger foods while we sipped glasses of wine. Zero preparation, and tons of taste. Pickling a variety in the summer and serving these foods up for holidays could easily become a tradition.

As always, for "Lappsgiving," we made the holiday menu from the current issue of Vegetarian Times. This year's "French twist" menu was not as scrumptious as that in 2009 or 2010, but it was still pleasing to our palettes.

The foods we decided to make were:

Salad of Shaved Fennel, Oranges, and Candied Pecans (YUM!)

Spiced Balsamic Beet Compote (DOUBLE YUM...a definite keeper!)

Seiten Timbales with Chestnut-Champignon Stuffing

...and, of course, we made the same dessert we always make for Thanksgiving: Ginger Sweet Potato Pie.

Ginger Sweet Potato Pies

Mostly because I don't want to forget either the candied pecan recipe or the spiced balsamic beet compote recipe, I'm going to share them here.

First, the candied pecans. These would go well in virtually any fall salad.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup pecans, halved and quartered
1 Tbs. pure maple syrup
1/2 tsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 pinch cayenne pepper

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Toss pecans with maple syrup in a small bowl. Add sugar, salt, and cayenne pepper. Toss to coat.
2. Spread nuts on baking sheet, and roast 10 minutes or until crispy and aromatic.
3. Cool for 10 minutes.

And, now for a new favorite appetizer, which is sure to turn up again and again in our house. We liked it over goat cheese on a sourdough baguette, but my parents liked it over cream cheese. This is a great way to use a lot of beets!

Spiced Balsamic Beet Compote
Ingredients:
1/2 cup golden raisins (we used dates because that's what we had, but I bet raisins would be even better!)
2 large beets (about 3 cups)
2 Tbs. olive oil
1/2 tsp. garam masala or curry powder
2 shallots (we used one onion and one clove of garlic)
2 Tbs. balsamic vinegar
2 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt 

Instructions:
1. Cover raisins with boiling water, and let stand 30 minutes.
2. Cook beets in large pot of boiling water for 10 minutes, or until tender. Drain and set aside.
3. Heat oil in large skillet over medium  heat. Add spice, and cook 20 seconds. Add shallots (or garlic and onion), and saute 20 minutes. Stir in beets, raisins, vinegar, sugar, salt, and 1/2 cup water.
4. Cover, and simmer 20 minutes, or until compote is thickened. Cool.

Quintessentiallly Summer: Grilled Veggie Sandwiches

Isn't it mind-boggling how fast summer flies?  I am a warm/hot-weather girl. About 98% of my hobbies require weather that involves no snow, so as the calendar creeps back towards winter, I begin having almost palpable anxiety. Every year, right around August 1st, it seems I panic ~ wanting every day and night to be quintessentially summer. 

Well, two days ago, the stress set in. I realized I'd be turning another year older in a few weeks (eeks!), school would be in full swing - meaning my "free weekend time" would again consist of grading papers, and the weather would take a nasty (in my humble opinion) turn towards the bitter cold. I guess time gives us perspective. Perhaps if the weather were beautiful all of the time, I would take it for granted and not give each and every day the attention it deserves.

So, with all of this in mind, on Friday evening, we had a lovely, perfectly summer experience. We put a blanket down in a shady part of the yard, got Franklin the puppy settled, and snacked on cherries, veggies and humus, and melon...and, of course, sipped on wine. I read mindless magazines, and Andy took a nap. Then, we fired up the grill to make veggie sandwiches with cream cheese. This meal was an attempt at recreating my absolute favorite sandwich in Madison, the West of the Andes sandwich (don't forget to ask for cream cheese!) at The Weary Traveler.

What's great about this type of meal (if you're not going for absolute recreations) is that WHATEVER might be in season at the time works.

We grilled carrots and beats and topped them with fresh arugula, tomatoes,avocado, and cream cheese and squashed it all in the middle of a hearty burger bun for this night's version, but later in the year, perhaps it'll be grilled winter squash and beets with fresh spinach and blue cheese. Who knows? The fridge and the season will be the deciding factors.

On the side, we served grilled baby bok choy. Delicious.

Despite my all-things-good-end-with-summer fear, I do look forward to the tastes of each season. Fall  brings veggie chili. Winter brings black bean soup. I can get excited for those. I just need reminders! ...until cold temps, another birthday and another school year creep in though, I'm going to try and make each day quintessentially summer.

Christmas Dinner: A Traditional Thanksgiving Feast?

If you've read any of our recent holiday entries, you will have noticed that we partake in a traditional turkey dinner on Thanksgiving and then a vegetarian feast the day after. So, on Christmas Day, Andy doesn't miss the annual opportunity to make a sustainable Thanksgiving dinner. This year, we threw the cookbooks out, called family members to get recipes, and opened our refrigerator and cupboard in a vow to try to buy very little but the actual turkey itself.


After our "research," our menu consisted of the following:

Appetizers:

• Cheese from our CSA box and crackers
• Canned Pepper Jelly, cream cheese, and crackers
• Irish cream/mimosas/red wine
• 
  

Feast

• Turkey
• Mashed Roots
• Mushroom Gravy
• Stuffing
• Buttered Beets
  
• Cranberry Relish
• A bottle of a big hearty Zinfandel (or two!)
  

Dessert:

• Andy's dad's peanut clusters and coffee

Preparing this year's dinner made me truly thankful for our CSA. Having prepaid for our CSA box, we had to spend very little money other than for our turkey, crackers, some of the ingredients for drinks and the actual alcohol itself. We bought our turkey from a local farm, which helped the screaming, animal rights vegetarian within me to find a bit of peace with the soon-to-be cooking bird inside my home. Buying our food from local sources insures our money is going into the hands of the farmer and his workers. Plus the animals are allowed to walk and frolic for much of their lives as animals should, no matter what the end result. What a great holiday feeling for all involved!

Now for the recipes:

To make the turkey, Andy used the Poquette Thanksgiving turkey as a model. The night before, he soaked the turkey in the following brine:

2 cups salt
2 cups sugar
various herbs and spices (typically sage, thyme, oregano, pepper, etc.)
enough water to cover the bird

He submersed the bird in the brine inside of a cooler for 10 hours. The recommended time frame is 8-12 hours.

The next day, he stuffed our 12 lb. bird and put it in the oven for roughly 3.5 hours at 350 degrees. Obviously depending on the size of your bird, that might change. To check if the bird is done, either use a meat thermometer to be sure the coldest part of the turkey is at a minimum of 165 degrees and/or (Andy and my mom's favorite method) lift and twist a leg ~ if it pulls away from the bird with ease, it's done.

And now for everyone's favorite: the stuffing! Andy L.O.V.E.S. his dad's traditional stuffing, so there was no question as to where we'd get the recipe. Now this recipe might take some interpretation based on your culinary abilities, but who am I to alter the words of a family tradition? Here is the recipe, word-for-word as given to us, and I quote:

Simmer giblets in crock pot overnight with onion, celery, garlic, whatever-
Peel off neck meat. Put in processor with other giblet stuff and chop.
Sage and Onion
bread cubes
onion-chop
celery-slice
apple-slice beer
stock

Andy took the liberty of adding some leftover, stale cornbread, but other than that, pretty much followed the recipe "step-by-step." To make both vegetarian and regular stuffing, he simply combined all ingredients first and then added the turkey parts to just a portion, which later was stuffed into the turkey.

We didn't have any potatoes left in the house, so we decided to botch the myth that potatoes are necessary for a holiday feast and made mashed roots instead. They were so delicious!!!

Mashed Roots
cream cheese
butter
salt
milk
Any amount of any of the following roots will suffice:
rutabagas
turnips
celeriac

Peel and chop roots. Boil until tender. Drain water. Mash roots with cream cheese, milk, butter, and salt until desired consistency. We topped this off with gravy, but it was magnificently delicious on its own as well.


Buttered Beets
beets
butter
salt and pepper

Scrub beets clean. Boil beets until tender. Then slice off the ends and discard. Cut beets into bite-sized pieces. Serve with butter, salt and pepper. So simple, yet so very good!

Finally, the cranberry relish. My intention was to mimic the yummy raw cranberry salad from our Thanksgiving dinner at the Poquettes, but unfortunately, I didn't read Uncle Jim's recipe until Christmas Day... I was supposed to have made it the night before and refrigerated it. Oops! Next year, I guess. So, I threw together what I could. It turned out sweetly tart and tasty.

Cranberry Relish
1 pint cranberries
1 cup of orange juice
1.5 cups sugar
1 two-inch pieced of thinly sliced ginger
1 cup water
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves

Combine the water and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Add the orange juice and ginger. Reduce heat and simmer, uncovered for 20 minutes. Add the cranberries, cinnamon, and cloves and cook, uncovered, until thickened, about 15 minutes. Pour into a bowl and let cool. Serve.

What a feast!

Beet Salad

We love beets! Oddly, when we first started getting our CSA box, Andy was not a fan. Since then, he has learned to love their earthy, dark flavor. Every year, we pickle, juice, and roast them. This year, we've been using them quite often in salads. Below is the recipe for one that we found especially scrumptious!

Fall Beet Saladleaf lettuce
baby beets, steamed and sliced
raspberries
blue cheese, crumbled
walnuts
balsamic vinaigrette (homemade or store-bought)

Toss all to your liking. Enjoy with Chardonnay!