Well with all the recipes using greens I was at risk of turning into the turnip leaf version Pvt. Benjamin Buford 'Bubba' Blue from Forest Gump, so heres another beetroot recipe.
This is a beetroot salad from Maharajtra in Western India.
Kosambir are very simple no-cooking, mix and match recipes with raw vegetables/lentils, are healthy and easy to make.
1lb of peeled grated beetroot
1/2 cup peanuts and/or cashews roughly crushed
1/2 cup onion finely chopped
5 springs Coriander finely chopped,
(I used Osaka Mustard greens for extra heat)
1 Tsp roasted cumin powder
Green Chilies, finely chopped to taste
Lemon or Lime juice to taste
Salt to taste
If it is available, a little coconut milk can be nice to turn the chilies into a paste.
Just throw in a bowl and mix. If you are grating/shredding the beetroot by hand, don't wear anything you don't mind losing, this is one recipe that men have a right to wear an apron for
Beets are very healthy. A lot of recipes ask that you add sugar, but small beets are very sweet.
The beets and onions have a lovely crunch to them.
Add the chopped onions to the salad only when serving, otherwise the salad loses its freshness.
Its also best served a little chilled, so stick in the fridge for about an hour before serving.
It can be a lunch salad, or a side dish with curries.
You can make it mild or hot.
TOP TIP: Have this mixed with cold leftover rice, especially basmati - delish.
आप का खाना स्वादिष्ट हो (āp kā khānā svādiṣṭa ho) as they say in hindi, but dont ask me to pronounce it.
Well, I always wanted to do this, these were literally from plot to pot and pickled. Its not that tricky a job, but there are a few major pointers highlighted in the blog.
Main thing is to keep everything clean as you can, the rest is simple.
After a lot of research, I found some of the best advice at gardenfork.tv and pickyourown.org as a basis, but there are a few extra bits and bobs.
I have grown what I am assured are a hardy gherkin, but they are not up yet, so the beets go first.
I bunch cropped the beetroot - two types grown at different intervals.
One type was Bolthardy, a fairly common variety, the other was Golden Burpe.
It was time to start cropping, the first sowings are big enough to pull, and the later sowings need the space.
To get a nice red pickle I went for the bolthardy, and they do seem to grow faster than the other type.
The only vinegar I could find locally was Chefs malt vinegar, but I will be using cider or wine vinegars down the road. Certainly, in theory, I could make my own cider vinegar from local apples, so the next batch will be done with cider vinegar.
The first step was to top, tail and peel the beetroot. Some folks say just boil them and peel after prior to pickling, that is your choice.
But, to maintain as much of the original flavour and nutrients I roasted most of them tightly sealed in tinfoil, to let them steam in their own liquids.
I kept enough for one jar to be blanched and loaded, nearly raw as an experiment on texture and pickling, but the general rule with beets is to cook them prior to picklng.
6 tennis ball size beets, topped, tailed, quartered.
These went in the oven for 45 minutes at 200 deg. C (400f)
MUSTARD AND MALT BRINE
Before you do a brine yourself, do a bit of research, I went with what I had in the house
Also test as you go, balance it up to suit your palette, its very easy to vary.
If you want a sharper taste, add lemon juice or more vinegar, a sweeter taste add more sugar or honey.
When tasting, take very little brine in the spoon, have a glass of water on standby and try not to inhale the steam, trust me, its an eye watering lung buster.
300ml distilled malt vinegar
200ml malt vinegar
250ml water
4 tablespoons Lakeshore wholegrain mustard with Guinness- or mustard seed if you like
1 heaped tablespoon of salt - Try to find non-iodized sea salt
4 heaped tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon honey
1 small onion
These are the spices I used for this batch
4 bay leaves
4 cardamom pods
4 cloves
4 sprigs of fennel (these were thinning's)
1/2 lemon, quartered
1 chili
1/2 inch ginger
2 cloves garlic
1/2 teaspoon of:
mixed spice
ground coriander
pepper corns
Tarragon
Dill seed
Bring to the boil until sugar and salt well dissolved.
MAKE SURE THE WINDOW IS OPEN IN THE KITCHEN - the vinegar can be bloody strong when boiling.
CANNING/JARRING
I'm sure you can buy jars and lids - these are best, but I just recycled some jam jars.
These need to be spotless - as do the lids, I washed and rinsed several times.
You will need at least one pot with boiling water - this is called the canner.
I used two, I use a fish kettle to maintain sterility and a pot to use as the canner.
Handle with care, I got them really hot using the fish kettle as a steamer, so they were at least 100c coming out.
I used a pair of oven gloves, but there are special thongs etc if you intend on doing this on a regular basis.
Carefully remove the jar from whatever steriliser you are using, move fast. The idea is to fill, clean and close as quickly as possible to maintain sterility.
I placed a bit of ginger, some fennel thinning's, a little chili and a clove of garlic in each jar.
Then I loaded it up to within 2cm of the top with the roasted beetroots.
After that I ladled in the hot brine, the only thing removed from the kettle were the lemon rinds.
Everything else went into the pickle jar.
Cover the beets, I filled to within 1cm of the top of the jar.
YOU MUST LEAVE OVERHEAD SPACE BETWEEN THE LIQUID AND THE LID
The next part is perhaps the most important AFTER filling the jar remove the lid from steriliser
Have a clean tea towel or kitchen roll at hand.
Make absolutely sure there is no residue inside the lid of the lip
Give the threads and the lip of the jar a wipe - make sure there is no residue of any kind where the jar makes contact with the lid.
After that I transferred the jars to the canner, a deep pot half filled with boiling water.
Cover and let sit for 5 minutes
With the lid off, this causes the pickle to steam, lowering the air pressure just above the liquid.
One thing I found was taking clingfilm, hold over the jar mouth. Slowly lower the sheet (peel/sterile side down) over the jar mouth, because of the heat of the jar, the clingfilm will close in on the grooves.
This stops contact between the metal lid and acidic pickle, so the taste will not be spoiled my metallic contamination.
I then put on and and hand tightened the lid.
The jars sat there for another 10 minutes.
Remove from canner and allow to cool.
I was very happy to see the vacuum tabs on the jars depress.
I could hear them click, or ping back down into position.
That is the only indication that I have of a good, airtight seal.
Another trick is to invert the jar, and make sure there is no stream of bubbles getting in, this is especially true if you have a piece of plastic between lid and lip.
These can be kept in a fridge, or a cool dark place
SHELF LIFE AND STORAGE
As far as general rules for shelf lives of common veggies and fruits jarred foods do well stored in a dark, dry and cool place.
Be sure to label all jars with pickling date.
Glass is inert, but the lid is not. Some people advise putting a small square of clear plastic between the contents and the lid - as you will find with home made jams.
The only reason I did not do this is that I did not have a suitable plastic, fairly sure a cut square of a sandwitch bag would do the trick.
From what I gather on the Internet, you are looking at 6-8 months shelf life with common jam jars.
Using proper pickling jars and new lids, its longer.
Generally speaking, spoilage is indicated by:
The lid is bulged or flexes (isn't sucked down tight), then gas has built up from decay.
Any signs of seepage or leaks (the jars should be fairly clean come out of the water bath).
Finally, an off smell, visual signs of mold, or a change in color or texture from what it should be!
Anyway, I will keep people updated as to how it goes.
Well, the biggest pest I have found in the garden is not slugs, snails or worms - it's 3 kittens and two puppies.
The kittens are sort of mine, their mother used to hang around and turned up one day with these three.
A cousin of mine called his dog Dev, so in retaliation I named these three (left to right) Vladamira (after Lenin) Joesephina (after Stalin) and Leon (after Trotsky)
Vlademira is the quietest and shyest, Joesephina is exactly like her namesake, going into places where she is not welcome - but even though she is the smallest, she is a ruthless and successful little hunter.
Leon is just a scrounger, rarely leaving the front door - but of the three he is the most tame.
They are fairly feral, certainly not house cats, but their mum, Southpaw, died - and as she was a cool cat I kinda ended up adopting these three.
They have two pals from next door - two pups called Jack and Brownie who visit on occasion, so as I wander around the veg garden I am usually stalked by two enthusiastic pups and three howling cats - none of whom I regard properly as my own!
They do add character to the place, but the amount of work I have had to do to keep them out of the veg beds is nuts, I wish they did not regard them as the biggest toilets they ever saw.
It is true what they say, that dogs have owners, cats have staff - these three little hooligans seem to think my sole purpose in life is to feed them, and that's about the only time I get to handle them - but they do make me laugh, especially when they get stuck in trees, and their undignified descents
On the note of a kitchen garden and pets I came accross another blog, not unlike mine -- food flora and felines -- well worth a read
I don't want to be like Pvt. Bubba from Forrest Gump and his shrimp - but its another turnip leaf recipe.
Its a very economical way of using something we Irish would normally throw away.
Anyone with a kitchen garden will need to thin plants out, and that includes turnip.
The main leaves I used were from Milan Purple top, but cabbage leaf, beetroot leaf and mustard greens can all be used. Kale is ideal for this recipe.
We have great bacon and cabbage in this country, but as a change from the usual ham and parsley sauce all the cabbage and bacon recipes on this blog are variations on that tradition, its nothing unusual, just a way at looking at things a little differently.
In the states this is made a lot with ham hocks or salted smoked meats like turkey leg - the main idea is to get as much flavour into the stock as is possible.
Collard greens are a staple of the southern States of the US, served with the cheaper preserved cuts of meat like smoked pork collar is obviously based on what would be a poor mans food, but it is full if taste and flavour.
This, along with corn bread and gumbo, is the taste of the south.
I just fiddled around with it a little to suit the ingredients more to Ireland.
Anyway - these are the ingredients I used
3 rashers
1 pint chicken stock
Tabasco
balsamic vinegar
Chili powder
3 full onions - including leaf
Clove of garlic
Mixed leaves, about 2 Ibs mostly turnip with some beetroot leaf and Mustard greens
Salt and pepper
Butter
Method
Prepare the greens by washing well. Remove large stems and fairly finely shred the leaves, just grab a bunch, ball 'em up fairly tight and slice into them
Melt butter in a heavy based pot
Put in chopped bacon (or other strong flavoured meat) diced onions, garlic and a good belt of Tabasco, a little vinegar and a good pinch of chili powder. Salt and Pepper to taste.
Saute in the pot on a low to medium heat until onion opaque and soft
Add 1 pint chicken stock, raise heat and bring to the boil
Reduce heat to a simmer - pile in the greens (I filled the pot)
Cover and allow greens to reduce
After about 20 minutes give them a stir, get the broth all over the greens - taste now to adjust seasoning, you can even add more greens if you like.
Allow to cook for a further 10 minutes
Serves about 3 people.
That's it - I served it with a simple champ potato's (mashed with some butter, milk and Shallots) and some spiced up pork that was diced and dusted with a flour/paprika/chili powder mix and fried with a little chorizo.
Simple, cheap southern staple, strong tasting - more an autumn or spring meal.
Goes very well with light, fruity whites - I had it with a Besthelm 2006 Muscat from Alsace, no great fan of whites but this was good - so I guess any Reisling type white would work well.
I'd also reccommend getting some Polsh sour dough bread to go with this - really sets it off well.
It freezes very well so if you have a lot of leaves, eat what you can and save the rest
Nicoise salad is really the taste of the summer - a classic southern French salad with eggs, beans and oily fish. There are no beans in this recipe - simply because they have not grown yet, and you do miss the crunch, but its something to build on for later in the year.
The classic Nicoise uses Tuna, but for an Irish twist one could always use poached (as in cooked, not hooked) Salmon or Mackerel fillets.
After a day stacking turf, the last thing I wanted to do was cook, so this is a real cupboard meal, using things most people would have at hand
It is such an easy meal to prepare, and I love the fact that all the veg came out of the Kitchen Garden, so its really a big deal for me - this is what starting a kitchen garden is all about.
NOTE: I serve this in a deep plate
Ingredients
Cold new potato's
1 clove Garlic
1 large Shallot
Baby Lettuce (3 small heads that were being thinned out)
1 tin Sardines - You can use any oily fish, Herring, Salmon, Mackerel etc for a more Irish flavour - Crab meat as well, but this will change the texture of the meal. I would not use a smoked fish.
1 Egg per person
Mayonnaise
Olive Oil
Balsamic Vinegar
Salt & Pepper
Cayenne Pepper
Paprika
Butter with herbs, garlic, smoked Salmon, Gravlax or Anchovy - whatever is at hand.
Squeeze of Lemon or Lime
If you have them, french beans lightly steamed or boiled, strained and allowed go cold - a small knob of butter while they are cooling and a whizz round the pot to coat does no harm.
Method.
Green Salad (plate base or edge)
Wash and dry salad leaves
Dressing
1/3rd Balsamic Vinegar and 2/3 Olive oil
Pinch of salt and Pepper
1/2 clove garlic - I finely grate this in
spoon whole grain mustard - I tend to use a 50/50 blend of Lakeshore wholegrain mustard with Guinness and the old reliable Colmans English
Shake well and pour over green leaves, toss the salad.
Potato Salad (plate centre)
Cold potato's
Green part of Shallot to taste and a sprig Parsley finely chopped
Enough Mayonnaise to coat potato's
Pinch of Cayenne (adds spiciness) I really reccommend this
Put in a bowl and mix
If you have time, leave to chill in fridge, and it will keep for about 3 days. The longer it sits with the Cayenne, the spicier - great contrast with the fish and eggs
Egg, quartered, plated up with sardines - lightly sprinkled with a little paprika
Sardines: I drain them, give them a squeeze of Lime and garnish with the chopped bulb of the Shallot, but you have a range of suitable Irish fish like herring, mackerel, salmon, trout etc - as long as its oily, poached and cold.
Some toast fingers, or brown soda bread for a more Irish flavor - served with an egg cup or ramekin of butter flavored as you like, I just did a herb butter.
This is a really nice, easy to make meal - perfect for lunch with a cup of tea or these late summer evenings with a chilled Rose wine, or white of your choice. I went with a simple Chianti.
I did miss the beans, but the fresh Shallot gave a nice, tangy sweet bite to the whole meal.
Later in the year I'll do a more 'Irish' version with poached Salmon or trout and brown soda bread - but it is such a flexible recipe - fresh veg, fish, eggs - voila - Serve and enjoy - et Bon Appettit
