Layered Puree Of Roasted Beetroots & Their Greens

Our beet crop is in full swing. Roasting veggies is a wonderful way of preparing them, especially when serving as a mash because their moisture content is decreased to the point that flavour is intensified while the texture is made more pleasing. Beetroots are no exception. Cooler weather makes turning the oven on not too much of a big deal. Beets, along with radishes and turnips, work hard for the kitchen garden as they provide both roots and foliage resulting in a double harvest. Since red and green are complementary colours and pack a visual punch, I layered the roasted, creme-fraiche-enriched beet puree with a puree of greens sauteed in olive oil with garlic. Double harvest, double puree. Topped with a lemon slice and fleur de sel, it makes a light lunch or supper when served with cheese and crackers.

If beets with their greens are not to be had at your market, fret not, roasted beetroot puree topped with creme fraiche is wonderful.

Ingredients are bolded. To roast beets: Preheat oven to 204 degrees C/400 degrees F. (The beets can be roasted along with other stuff at lower temperatures but they will take longer.) Trim both tops and bottoms. Scrub well. Though they can be enclosed in foil, it is much easier to check doneness if they are placed in a foil-lined, lid-covered oven dish. Oil the foil. When checking them as they bake, if they look dry or sticking then add a bit of water. They are done when a knife inserted into their centres meets with no resistance. My melange of small to medium beets took about an hour. Peel carefully with a sharp knife, trimming away any dark bits as they tend toward bitterness. The finished beet will look translucent and bright red. If there are excess beets, let cool, portion, and then freeze. This way you can have borscht in the future. A tablespoon or so of creme fraiche or sour cream added to the blender or a stick mixer's container will ensure lusciousness. Salt to taste. Reserve.

To make the sauteed greens puree: Wash the beet greens.

Trim off most of the red stems as they make a grainy texture in addition to being quite bitter.

Dry them in a kitchen or paper towel.

In a large pot, heat up some olive oil (if you adore olive oil slicked greens as much as I do, then thinly cover the pot's bottom with the oil) over medium low heat. Add as much minced fresh garlic as you want and saute for a minute (no browning!) or as in my case, if you are making do with garlic powder, wait until the greens are added. Turn the heat to high and depending on the size of the pot and the amount of greens, add them in increments. As they start to wilt, add more, stirring all the time. Cover, and lower heat to a small flame, braise until tender, around ten minutes. During that time, check to see if a bit of water needs to be added to prevent any burning and sticking. Blend till smooth. Salt to taste.

To present: When layering, first spoon the puree close to the sides of the glass and then work towards the centre. This way the demarcated layers will be clearly seen from the outside. Start with the greens, followed with the beetroot, another layer of greens, and then edge the top with beetroot letting the previous layer of greens to peek through. Cut a thin slice of lemon from its edge to its centre and then twist it into a swirl, topping the double puree with it. Sprinkle with fleur de sel. I served it at room temperature, but it can be chilled if desired. The sweetness from the beetroots contrasted nicely with the slight bitterness of the greens. Lovely to look at, and lovely to eat.

À la prochaine!

High Summer 2020

A fresh spring garden, all bright green and friendly, became a lush summer solstice one which is now becoming a glorious mature profusion but not surprisingly showing signs of wear and tear. Watering, weeding, and deadheading will prolong the abundance for a while.

There are three large pots of orange/yellow calendula and deepest blue lobelia, all sowed from seed, throughout our garden. They did need to be sprayed with sulfur to combat a fungal disease called calendula smut. And they may need to be dosed again in order for them to continue flowering all through summer.

For years now social media images of a pot on its side spilling out lobelia visually simulating a small stream intriqued me, and this was the summer I finally got around realising this clever concept.

The 'stream' flows amidst cannas and dahlias. I love it so. It was just a matter of burying one quarter of the depth of an empty pot put on its side, filling it one thirds with soil, and planting by laying the roots laterally with the flowers placed beyond the pot's opening before topping up with more soil. 

It is now the fourth summer that this fragrant tuberous begonia has graced a small sous sol window sill. I hope it will bloom yet again in 2021.

Pots of miniature roses have found their home in a large tub along with a blueberry bush. In this way, not only does the display look full, when the roses are watered/fertilised so is the blueberry!

Hydrangeas are now fading into glorious subtle tones/texture and by autumn will become much like silver lace which always is a treat to behold.

The ivy topiary heart is being shaped gradually.  I just love it! Sculpting greenery is fun and gives so much joy. The structure on which it grows is a thick honeysuckle trunk that gave up the ghost nearly a decade ago. Requiring both patience and decisiveness makes topiary quite a learning experience.

Beets are putting out foliage which when thinned are added to minestrone.

Green beans are flowering. Soon tiny pods will appear and in several weeks they will be ready for picking.

À la prochaine!

Summer Is Right Around The Corner . . .

In about a week, it will be officially summer. There has been consistent rains for the last month which has delayed garden tasks that would have been best done before June such as sowing annual flowers like varied-coloured, long-term-flowering cosmos and zinnias; the last of the edible crops, graceful, stylish Tuscan kale with its smoky green-black leaves; fast-growing cover crops like mustard and tansy to revive the completely harvested pea beds (they provided about 5 litres of pods!). Hopefully, if we can believe the forecast, the next week will be sunny and the soggy soil should be workable fairly soon so those postponed tasks can be eventually completed. Regardless, the garden is humming along, with beloved-by-the bees, aromatic lavender, punchy poppies that reseed themselves through the years, and haughty Queen Elizabeth roses.

The potato variety, Daifla, flowers profusely. (That's the raspberry patch in the background, and if you look closely you will see the berries.) Potato blooms signify that the tubers are being formed. In about two months, when the haulms (the growth above ground) have wilted yellow, it will be time to harvest.

The dark green of ivy makes a good backdrop for rhubarb and potatoes. In the upper left, a drooping branch of a Mirabelle plum tree can be seen with its immature fruit looking like green olives. When ripe, they will be a glorious gold flushed with red.

Most of our potato blooms are pure white but there are a few which are tinted mauve. An interesting aside is that Marie Antoinette, a passionate lover of flowers, was known to have tucked some potato blossoms in her hair during the time Antoine Parmentier was trying to convince the movers and shakers that the New World upstart wasn't poisonous. 

Every other day, there's enough raspberries, strawberries, and blueberries to fill up the dessert bowl. Since blueberries must have acid soil to flourish, our bush is grown in a pot with the desired potting mix.

The rambunctious wild area which harbours lizards, hedgehogs, birds, and insects is festooned with bramble blossoms. The middle bed is filled with bushy Roma tomato plants and in front of them are beets which since have seen the trusty cultivator tool which has cleared away the prolific clover.

During a month these well-established daylilies put out many blooms, each lasting just a day. There are cultivars which are everblooming from early summer to autumn which will soon find a place in our garden.

David Austin climbing rose, Falstaff, is beginning a second round of flowering.

In the front garden, yet more lavender and also Shasta daisies are just starting to bloom. The other day, our neighbour across the street told me that she loves seeing, as does her visitors, the small green haven in front of our home. After all this time, it is known by a few that je jardine comme une folle (I garden like a madwoman). The English lavender is putting on the show right now while the late-blooming French lavender waits to take the spotlight in about a month.

From the vantage point of a reclining, cushy chair under the pergola, this is what I get to see: foliage of mums, rose of Sharon, calla lilies, ivy, two enormous, neighbouring spruce trees, and the imperious blooms of a Queen Elizabeth rose. All of this exuberant growth exists in an urban space. Though I can hear the distant din of traffic, I pretend that it's the sound of ocean waves.

À la prochaine!