Both Aaron and I love beets. i picked these up at the Irondequoit Farmers Market. I had a beet salad at an Italian restaurant in Chicago that I wanted to recreate.
First I roasted the beets. This couldn't be easier. I wrapped them in aluminum foil and put them in the oven at 400 degrees for one hour.
I read a tip once that to easily skin roasted beets just rub them with a paper towel. It really works! I love the color of beets!
I couldn't find a recipe online for a beet salad that was just like the one I had in Chicago, so I sort of made it up as I went along. I sliced the cooled beets and arranged them on a plate with some baby salad greens. Next I sprinkled crumbled feta cheese and glazed walnuts on top. Then I drizzled some extra virgin olive oil and a balsamic vinegar sauce over everything. The sauce is just a quarter cup of balsamic vinegar and a quarter cup of sugar warmed on the stove until the sugar disolves and it is velvety smooth.
The salad was sooo good! We will definitely be having this again.
I forgot to blog about some of the heirloom veggies we got from the garden this summer. We planted a purple pepper... and got just this one. It was green on the inside. I chopped it up into salsa.
We also planted these heirloom lemon cucumbers. They tasted just like regular cucumbers.
We have been getting a lot of corn with our CSA veggies and I wanted to make something different. After a little poking around I decided on Mexican grilled corn.
I even got cotija cheese - a Mexican cheese.
It's pretty easy to make. Grill the ears of corn on the bbq grill. When it's nice and browned, roll the corn in melted butter, smear on some mayo, sprinkle with crumbled cotija cheese, sprinkle with cayenne pepper and then add a spritz of lime juice. That's it! Nom nom!
In our last batch of CSA veggies, we got some hot peppers.
I didn't know what to do with them until a friend on Facebook recommended hot pepper jelly. Perfect!
This will be so tasty on crackers with cream cheese or on toasted baguette with brie.
Here is my recipe:
1 cup chopped jalapenos peppers
2 cups chopped red bell peppers
5 lbs sugar
3 cups apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 packages Ball Fruit Jell Liquid Pectin
Disolve sugar in the vinegar and lemon juice. Add the peppers and let boil for 2 mintues. Add liquid pectin and let rest for 10 minutes. Fill the jelly jars and let them seal.
We have been getting fresh corn on the cob with our CSA veggies. Sometimes that is all I need for supper! I have been reading about Mexican Corn on the Cob. I think that is what I am going to try with the next batch we get.
I forgot to mention that our CSA farm is going again. Here is last week's haul...
... and this week's veggies. Those red peppers were grilled with the onion for chicken fajitas and I'm thinking those green peppers will become stuffed peppers. Most of the cucumbers were made into a cucumber salad, the peas eaten with spaghetti noodles, butter and parmesan cheese and the lettuce with rice and hot pepper paste (Korean treat) Just saw a great idea for the zukes... zucchini bread with a layer of cream cheese in the center. Nom nom.
And this pumpkin. A pumpkin vine spouted from our compost bin this spring. Lots of pumpkin vines really. Here's a composting tip... don't throw all your jack-o-lantern guts in the composter unless you want a bunch of pumpkins growing out of it. For some reason this was the only vine that survived our rainy summer and it only had one pumpkin on it. The pumpkin was about 7 feet from the begining of the vine and grew on the garage alcove roof.
I am very proud of my one pumpkin. I made Aaron take this Martha-esque picture of me with it.
We are loving the veggie haul we are getting from our co-op farm.
This is what we got today... see those two green peppers?
We made them into stuffed peppers for dinner. I don't even like green peppers, but I like stuffed peppers. I just eat the guts out of them and leave the pepper carcass behind. Cheese is also key.
