I love beets. I cook them just like I cook whole potatoes: boil them whole, unpeeled, in plain water, until they are fork tender, like potatoes. When slightly cooled, steady the beet with a fork and remove the peel - the peel slides right off. Then slice and season with salt & pepper, maybe butter, sometimes a few drops of vinegar, serve hot or cold.

I don't want to offend any delicate sensibilities here but if you don't usually eat beets (your guests may not) it's only fair to warn them that in the next 24 hours, their urine and possibly their "other" will be dark red. The first time they see it, they will be quite alarmed, as it looks like blood. It is, of course, only coloring and not harmful or indicative of anything except having eaten beets. It only takes about one beet per person to have this effect.

If you do it, please be sure to post a picture of your serving platter. It sounds beautiful!

Sherry

Like Sherry, my favorite way to have fresh beets is simply boiled until tender, run them under cool water to slip the skins, then slice and serve with salt and pepper. Yum.

I also read that beets have more natural sugar than corn, carrots or sweet potatoes, which is probably why I like them. Canned is flatter in flavor but fresh is sweet and good, I love 'em.

Your platter sounds beautiful, I'd like both ingredients.

Annie

We don't eat raw beets. Hubby likes cooked, pickled beets. I usually serve it as an appetizer to go with red meat. I have a couple of pickled beets recipes in file somewhere. Haven't made any since the pocket gopher took over our backyard. No more beets for us. :-(

Al

I like them boiled , skins on, until barely tender. Then slice, drizzle with melted butter, salt and pepper.

Not sure if this is true or not but my Mom told me leave the greens on the beets when cooking. She said that cutting the greens off would cause the beets to bleed and loose some of their colour.

So if you want them red, red then leave the greens on.

Personally, I think your dish might be enhanced visually by using both red beets, and gold beets.

I like steaming beets. Very easy and they remain firm.

Just a suggestion: I think golden beets would look even better!

I like them roasted -- well, if being wrapped in foil qualifies as roasting. I leave about an inch of the stems on -- and yes, they do bleed. I cook 'em an hour or so in a low oven 225 or a bit less. Let cool enough to slice or quarter ... add salt and pepper and splash with balsamic vinegar. serve at room temp ... and yes, they turn everything red.

Aabsolutely roast them!! You're not making soup, so why boil all the flavor out of them? Peel while still warm, and chill, slice thinly and dress with a vinaigrette flavored with Cumin. Sounds odd , but the flavor combination of the Beets and the Cumin is brilliant. Cold vinegary Beets next to warm sliced roast tenderloin sounds delicious! You could even do the beef as Carpaccio and serve a delicious cold plate.

Steve

Beets and pork chops. Just a suggestion.

dcarch

Very pretty - thank you all, this is great. I'll try preparing a couple different ways this week, inflict the results on the family aka guinea piggies, then decide on the dinner dish.

Um... Do the kids eat beets?

[grinning, ducking and running]

Another question on the beets. What type of beets do you buy (no garden here)? When I go to Harry's farmers market, there are a couple of different kinds - does it matter?

Beth

I love beets but I just can't get my mind around eating them raw. I have some which I am toying with lightly steaming and then marinating, but I dunno about completely raw. I have a recipe for a raw beet salad that is supposedly great. Hmmmm. I'm chicken.

"Um... Do the kids eat beets?
[grinning, ducking and running]"

No, not really. But there's always hope.

pllog, both my girls have always loved beets, and neither of the grandkids will touch them. It's odd...

As for "boiling the flavor" out of beets, I like them boiled or steamed until tender, but not over cooked until they are soft and mushy, they have to be able to retain their shape and texture. I don't like them as well roasted as I do boiled so it's another one of those "to each their own". I don't care for them much raw but I love them pickled or in an orange butter sauce.

Beth, I grow Detroit Dark Reds, they grow well and tolerate my 90 day growing season and they are my favorite, very consistent in flavor and yield. I've also grown Red Ace, which hasn't done as well, and Cylindra, which is long and thin, but I didn't care as much for the flavor, I didn't think it was as sweet. I've grown the golden beets too, Jessica gave me some seeds, and they were good but they didn't like my cool Michigan summer. Pale beets have a lower germination rate anyway, but my germination was about 25 percent and the beets stayed small. I think the variety was Touchstone and the flavor was really nice, so if you see them, give them a try.

Annie

Yeah, Annie, kids are so interesting about what they will or won't eat. I went from love mushrooms at age 3, to hate mushrooms through the tweens, to love mushrooms by 16, to mushrooms are good (not such strong opinion) as an adult.

I was just tweaking John because he was talking about feeding the beets to the family but posted his story about making a bunch of things the hungry kids don't eat. With multiple disasters along the way. It's a great story.

BTW, orange butter sauce? Sounds decadent and yummy!!!

Thanks Annie. I've got to educate myself too since that is one item on the 'canning' list if ever my economic slump is done with. Love pickled beets!

It's one of those situation of wanting to try regular cooked beets at home rather than taking a chance on getting them out somewhere. I'm sure to this day that's why I don't like kale - someone else didn't cook it right.

Now I see it, I remember that story. As for kids, good thing the grandkids don't like beets, more for me!

This sauce was originally meant for parsnips, but it's wonderful on beets and also on sweet potatoes. Readinglady gave it to me and I keep finding more things to put it on!

Orange butter sauce

Sauce:
1 stick butter
2 T. brown sugar
1 T. grated orange zest
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 T. cornstarch
1/2 cup orange juice
Melt butter in pan. Add sugar, zest and nutmeg. Stir cornstarch into juice and add, whisking as sauce thickens. Return cooked veggies to pan, tossing gently until well coated. Serves 4-5.

Annie

Others have quiet assurance, fiery bravado, studied routine. But most of us have hope. We always start with hope. As we dice, measure, mix, sear, and simmer, our hope carries us. As we wilt, scorch, curdle, and stick, our hope sustains us. Hope is what scrapes the char off us, picks the cat hairs out from us, scoops our spilled selves from the floor to a hasty rinse and a furtive plating. Only at the end, the soggy or burned end, the fallen or dessicated end, will hope leave us. And that's okay, because by then hunger has joined the party, and he eats anything.

Annie, thanks for the recipe!!

John, that's beautiful!

This is the time of year when I avoid fresh beets because most of what we get the next few months are ones harvested in early winter and stored until now. Their flavor is so much stronger than the fresh summer beets so I'll wait for them. The only time I've used raw beets has been grated for a red vinaigrette for a spinach and goat cheese salad.

This is my favorite beet recipe:

APRICOT-GLAZED BEETS Â 4 servings

2 Tbs. butter
1 tsp. lemon juice
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup apricot juice-*
1/8 tsp. freshly grated nutmeg
1/8 tsp. grated ginger root (optional)
12 to 16 baby beets, about 1 inch in diameter, cooked and peeled

In saucepan, combine all ingredients except beets. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Reduce to low and simmer for 4 to 8 minutes. Add beets and toss gently to coat. Heat through for one minute. You can use larger beets, cut into quarters or eighths.

* - To make your own apricot juice: Combine 1/4 cup dried apricots and 1 cup water in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer over very low heat for about 40 minutes, or until apricots are soft. Remove apricots (these can be diced and sprinkled over the beets or used in scones, nut bread, etc.)

In my youth, beets was the one veggie my poor parents could not get me to eat. I would gag! And it wasn't from lack of trying!
I think those childhood memories kept me from embracing them as an adult. But I continue to discover new ways of eating beets that are breaking down those taste barriers of old.

The first adventure was when an elderly woman friend who always had a big jar full of pickled beets and eggs on the counter offered me one of the eggs. Surprisingly I loved it! However the pickled beets were too strong.

But the big breakthrough came when I was served Borscht at a fine restaurant. I didn't have a clue what kind of soup it was or the ingredients which was probably a good thing. After having it as an appetizer I enjoyed it so much I opted to have another big bowl of it in lieu of a main course! And since that time I have acquired all kinds of recipes for Borscht which has as many versions and interpretations as our own American chicken soup - some use thin broth, others are packed with vegetables, some pureed, others chunky, etc. I prefer to roast the beets prior to adding them to the soup, along with some of the other root vegetable ingredients.
I now refer to it as the soup that can't be beet!!

Here's one recipe I just came across in The Brooklyn Cookbook that is very different than the ones I've tried before:

Anna Sternstein's Borscht
(Makes about 4-1/2 quarts)

2 pounds flanken or short ribs of beef
3 T. vegetable oil
3 medium beets, peeled and shredded
2 T. red-wine vinegar
2 tsp. sugar
8 medium onions, coarsely chopped
2 medium carrots, peeled and coarsely chopped
1 head of green cabbage, cored and shredded (bags of shredded veggies can often be found in the produce section).
6 cups canned tomatoes, pureed.
6 allspice berries, crushed
1 T. salt or to taste
3 bay leaves 2 T. finely chopped parsley
3-1/3 quarts water
1 T. minced garlic
3 T. snipped dill

-- Cover the flanken/meat with water and bring to the boil.
Lower the heat and simmer for 20 minutes
(this parboiling releases the 'scum').
Rinse the meat and set aside.
-- In a large stockpot, heat the oil and add the beets,
vinegar and sugar. Cook over moderate heat for 10 min.,
stirring occasionally.
Add the onions and carrots and cook, stirring, for 3 min.
Put in the cabbage, tomatoes, allspice, salt, bay
leaves, parsley and water. Bring soup to the boil, add
the flanken, and reduce the heat. Cover and simmer
gently for 1 hour.
-- After 1 hour, stir in the garlic. Cook 30 min. more,
adding a little water if the soup has cooked down.
-- Remove the flanken/meat and, when it is cool enough to
handle, cut it into 1-inch pieces. Return meat to the
stockpot. Correct the seasonings, adding salt, pepper,
or a little sugar as necessary. Serve sprinkled with
fresh dill.

Great served with a crusty dill bread.

The best part about beets are the greens.

Man, I love steamed/sauteed beet greens.
s&P, lemon squeeze.

Don't get me wrong, I also eat beet root and enjoy it but beet root is like my sister and beet greens are like Halle Berry.

Dragonfly, could you share some of our other favorite borscht recipes that you have come across? I love borscht and would love to try some different ways of making it.
Lisa

I love beets and grow them in my garden. My problem is that in the past I haven't grown enough, and so I put off harvesting, thinking I want to save those beets for a special time, thus saving them till they're big and tough. This year has been different. I dedicated a lot of room to beets. I'm intrigued, Annie, that there's a variety that doesn't like your cool Mich. summer, as I grow beets during the winter. I sow them in the fall, and have been harvesting them this spring. Metaxa, during the winter I harvest some of the greens, leaving the roots in the ground, as I love the greens, too. Then, as soon as the beets get big enough, I start harvesting the whole plants.

I've never boiled them. I may try that next time. I've roasted them most frequently, but I've also grated them and sauteed them if I want to cook them quickly.

I can't say I like them pickled, as the only pickled beets I've had were sweetened, and I have to say, yuck. I'm sorry, but yuck. Not a fan of canned beets, either. Fresh, though, are delicious.

Sally

I like beets cooked with butter, salt and pepper. I've never tried them raw. Of course the old Harvard Beets is still an excellent recipe even today. Here is Ina Garten's recipe and one of my favorite ways to use beets. You can use fresh instead of canned.

Beets with Orange Vinaigrette

3 (15-ounce) cans baby beets, drained
2 tablespoons raspberry vinegar
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice
3 tablespoons good olive oil
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup small-diced red onion (1 small onion)
2 large seedless oranges, zested
Segments 2 large seedless oranges

Directions
Drain the beets and dice into 1/2-inch cubes. Place the beets in a mixing bowl and add the raspberry vinegar, orange juice, olive oil, salt, pepper and red onions. Zest the oranges and then segment over a bowl to catch the juices. Add the orange zest, orange segments, and any juices and mix well. Taste for seasoning and serve cold or at room temperature.

Sally, as soon as we get a hard freeze, the beet tops die and then the beets stop growing. So, if you don't have a beet ready by first hard freeze, it doesn't get any bigger and the tops are soggy and rotten. Now, I've had collards that are still good in the snow, and swiss chard, but not those poor beets. They will store well in the garage or the root cellar, but they don't get any bigger than they were when the tops died.

Annie

lisa-in-germany,

I'd love to share more recipes but don't want to completely hijack johnliu's thread. I realized after posting my recipe and telling my story that it had nothing whatsoever to do with answering his initial question...lol! Sorry about that John!

So why don't I start a thread just about Borscht and everyone can contribute recipes! That way we'll all be able to share and compare. I'll have to do it later though, because I need to get to work. Or if you don't want to wait go ahead and start a thread and I'll chime in later.

I love beets, and was quite tempted the other day at the grocery store, but I controlled myself. It just isn't the right time of year. By now, they are not as sweet, nor as tender as I like.

Beets are also one of those foods that I would be wary of making a major part of a "company" meal, simply because they seem to be a love or hate type food...unless I knew ahead of time that all my guests like them, I'd not serve them except as a side dish that they could take a pass on if they didn't.

My husband always hated beets, but was too polite to say so the first time I made them, and he took a small portion. Surprise, he loved them! Turns out, his mother had only served canned beets (which taste like nothing much but can), he'd never had a fresh one!

I think I'm going to like this beet thing.

Since I've never cooked a beet before, or indeed even handled a whole one, it seemed wise to prepare beets at least once before the dinner in question.

I bought three beets. Roasted one. Boiled one. Sliced and pan-fried one. Wilted the greens. Also quickly cooked up some salmon and beef - not the good stuff that I'll hopefully serve my friends, just whatever was on sale at Safeway. Tried different condiments - melted butter, a mirin-sesame oil-soy sauce mix, wasabi, and garlic aioli. I liked the aioli best, but of course I'd like old shoes with aioli.

Salmon on wilted beet greens, sesame dressing. Crisped and thin-cut salmon skin, wasabi. I think it was the wrong dressing, next time I'll use a vinagrette.

Seared beef and roasted beets. Garlic aioli, added later. This dish does need a better (redder) cut of beef than I used for the practice run. I actually liked the sliced and pan-fried beets best, so that's what I'll do.

Gee, these iPhone pics are blurry.

Blurry Schmurry! Those plates look so good. I love beets and I adore rare roast beef. Please pass the chopsticks.
Lisa

They look very nice. Good luck with your dinner. You're smarter than I am. You practice a dish before serving it. I know I'm supposed to, but I rarely do.

Sally

Sliced and pan fried? From raw? Mmmm, maybe I'll give that a try. Any special oil or seasoning or tricks I need to know?

Thanks

I just fried them using a cast-iron pan, in the residual fat after the beef was seared, while the beef was resting. Not the healthiest approach, merely convenient. Seasoning was just salt and pepper.

For my friends I will break out the secret salt weapon . . . truffle salt.

Lovely John. I admire your discipline! I'm usually in the middle of a brand new recipe 20 minutes before the guest are due to arrive! LOL

Please report back after the event. Good luck!

Nice plating. Salmon and beef, surf and turf; nice combination.

Crispy salmon skin is better tasting than bacon. It's not easy to make.

dcarch

Quick report - the beet/beef pairing went pretty well.

Got some really great salmon and beef, also got another pound of salmon just for the skin (we'll eat the rest later), and there were some irresistible little mackerel with shiny eyes and glistening skin . . .

So the dinner ended up being
- sliced raw mackerel sashimi
- barely-cooked salmon on wilted beet greens, pink grapefruit slices, with grapefruit vinegarette and crispy salmon skin topping
- seared-rare beef slices with pan-fried beet slices, garlic aioli
- wild rice risotto with crumbled crisp bacon and roasted asparagus
- peach ice cream (was going to make lychee ice cream, but didn't have canned lychees and ran out of time to get any)

The only bummer was that one couple canceled out at the last minute, so it was only four of us. So, left-over city.

Left over city...is that a bad thing? I love left overs, except maybe not fish.

I'm intrigued by the wild rice risotto. It might be better as a separate thread, but can you post the recipe please? I thought risotto had to have a certain kind of rice that was fat and juicy, so to speak, which is not what I think of wild rice being. How'd you do it?

Sally

Ohhhh, myyyy!!!!

Lucky guests (but I'll bet they're used to your cooking) and lucky you with leftovers.

I don't have a recipe, but what I did was:
- 1 lb of a 50/50 mix of wild rice and brown rice (I just happened across this in the grocery store.)
- In 12'' saute pan, saute the rice, 1/2 onion diced, couple cloves of garlic, in olive oil over medium heat for about 10 min.
- Add 1 cup of liquid (big cloud of steam here) and a pat of butter, stir a couple times. Reduce heat to low. Pan is not covered.
- When liquid is almost gone, add another cup of liquid (and, every other time, another pat of butter), and stir a couple times.
- What ''liquid''? I used about 2/3rds wine (went though about 3/4 bottle of cheap chardonnay, drank the rest) and about 1/3rds chicken stock. Just switch back and forth capriciously.
- Start this about 3 hours before mealtime, after the initial saute it only requires 15 seconds of attention every 15 minutes or so. The dish doesn't show any signs of becoming creamy until about 1.5 hours in. At that point start tasting before each cup of liquid. In my case, after 2.5 hours it was as creamy as I wanted, so I just turned off the heat and covered it. Shortly before serving, give it a splash of chicken stock, a blast of heat, salt to taste.
- Compared to risotto from short-grain white rice, the wild rice risotto tends to be a little less creamy, the grains are more distinct. Its a more interesting texture, to me. But I suspect that you can get it as creamy as you like, simply with more time and more liquid.
- Sliced shiitake mushrooms are nice. But daughter loathes mushrooms, picks every piece out of her food, gagging and moaning, grossed-out face and accusing looks. We were having company, so I decide to skip the show. Instead, I added crumbled crispy bacon. Everything's Better With Bacon.

Thanks, Johnliu! I'm saving your recipe. LOL about your daughter! Oh, and I'm glad everything went well at your party.

Sally

Wow, just beautiful! The rare beef with the blood red beets sounds like a winning combination visually and for the palate. The presentation certainly is a work of art.
Those guests who had to cancel missed out on a rare treat.

If you or others continue to explore the potential uses of beets this recipe might be worth a try. And maybe it will inspire another meal, this time based on a yellow-themed color palette:

Roasted Beet, Apple and Goat Cheese Salad
Insalata di Bietole con Frutta di Stagione e Caprino

Serves 8

1 pound. roasted, small yellow beets
1 cup Granny Smith apple, matchstick-cut, or 16 ripe Black Mission figs cut in half, or 4 ripe peaches, peeled and cut in slices.
1 pound. roasted small red beets
4 tablespoon Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 tablespoon Red Wine Vinegar
1 tablespoon Balsamic vinegar
6 ounces of slightly aged goat cheese in a block which you can crumble.
salt and pepper

Clean beets, remove root tip and cut off stem and leaves, reserving and blanching until soft. Poke the beets all over with a fork and roast in a 400° F oven until tender when poked with a paring knife, 45 minutes to 1-one half hours, depending on the beets.
Let stand until cool enough to handle, then peel the beets. The beets are now ready to cut into six or eight slices depending on the size. Cut the stems into 1" pieces. Set all in a bowl.
Whisk the oil and vinegar. Add the stems and fruit. Season with salt and pepper. Toss well. Set on a plate dividing the remaining juice. Sprinkle with the goat cheese and serve.