biggest beet harvest ever here

[Horsea]

Thanks for the 'welcome back', plus all of your comments on storage.   

Beeherder, where do you live?  We are on the Canadian  prairie!  By the way, I have never heard of beets bolting.  How very odd.   

By the way, I never process any pickle containing vinegar and sugar.  Those 2 substances will kill anything that shouldn't be in the jar.  Small jars of pickles, jam & jelly - I just work fast to put the almost-boiling mixture in, seal quickly, then turn the jars upside down for c. 3 minutes.  Never had mold or anything.  I suspect that working fast is the trick. 

Needless to say, for genuine canning you of course have to process. 

I think that all this propaganda about having to now (as opposed to years ago before such things existed) pressure-process is the pressure canner mfrs drumming up business for themselves.     My mum never had a pressure canner and we never got sick and our vegetables never went bad. 

[The Future]

If the beets bolt, maybe those seeds would be useful to moi

[Beeherder]

 
I'll save those seeds for you if you want to give them a try The Future. With no other beet in flower they may not have gotten cross pollenated.

Beeherder's work ranch is in the Colorado foothills at 6500 ft elevation. Great southern exposure very rocky soil that requires serious supplements to grow veggies. When I make a new garden plot usually all the dirt is purchased and hauled  as 3-way mix of topsoil, yard mulch, dried turkey poop. Seems to work as long as I add leaves from the folks in town who have deciduous trees when they get collected about now. I bag the leaves for a year then use them as brown compost.

My canning mentor was merrily teaching me what she had been doing for years then last year she took a food preservation course through the CSU Extension Office. Wow, she made me re-learn a few things but mostly she just uses the "approved" recipies now. Me, maybe I'll just do what she taught me anyway. She's not drumming biz for anybody since she teaches Spanish and writes cook books. And me I just don't like to wait as long as it takes at higher altitudes to just boil without the pressure cooker.

Please tell us more about simple food storage methods, both ones that work and any that did not.

[Beeherder]

 
Guess its me that gets to report about a food storage technique that did NOT work as desired. Those beets hanging in the old onion bags in the cool room are compost. When they were put there all had about an inch of stem above the root cut cleanly, all were washed long tap root left attached. When I checked them moments ago as I was storing the final harvest it became apparent I need a different storage technique. Big harvest means nothing if you don't get to eat it. DANG!

So for now the 10 red beets (2 mongo large, 6 medium, 2 small) and 6 small Italian beets are in a ziplock bag in the veggie crisper. What to do?

[Horsea]

I read in my food storage book - hope I'm recalling this right - that beets are supposed to be packed in sand, and shouldn't touch each other.     I  mean, really...  can you imagine lugging all that sand and doing all that persnickety, fiddly packing, and so on and so forth.  I don't know if my experiment with wrapping them individually in newspaper will work, 'cuz you are supposed to keep them moist.  Well, at least they will be in a cool spot. 

The beets you buy in the supermarket, year round, are hard as rocks and in great shape.  The commercial produce  people sure seem to know their stuff.  I guess they have giant bins with absolutely perfect combo of humidity and temperature. 

[Beeherder]

 
Hello Horsea,

Thanks for your comments. I'm certain those commercial growers know how to store their produce else they lose any chance of return on their labor and capital efforts. Never seen a big beet storage place but have been in the large potato storage cellars in the San Luis Valley (south central Colorado) where large acerages of potato are grown, stored and used to be processed under the name Red Seal Potato Chips (back in the 70s). Temperature never changes more than a couple of degrees and I'll bet humidity doesn't either. That valley sometime records the lowest tempertures in the lower 48, USA, and those potatoes never know the difference.

Now how the heck can I duplicate that without the huge space, and massive capital investment, not to mention labor and laborers to make anything that big work? There's this space under my stairs where the temp is usually in the 50s but I can do hardly anything about the humidity issue. Lugging sand definitely will NOT work for me either.

Now there is not so much to deal with so maybe just a big batch of borstch. Do Ukrainian's have any favorite borstch recipies? I like making big batches of stuff to freeze or can. I'll post later today about my just finished home made tomato soup.

Thanks for your suggestions, everyone.

[Horsea]

The place under your stairs where you implied you may store your beets - will you just dump them on the floor or stick them in boxes or what. 

I can't bear to lose my beets anymore like I did in the past.  I will have to go on a boil-cool-skin-shred-package-freeze jamboree, but that is a lot of work.  Our freezer is not large, either.

I am still trying to make sense of wild highbush cranberries I found in a nearby forest.  There are SO MANY this year it's beyond belief.  Through the still-leafy trees they are like blotches of red, even from a distance.  So far I have made some jars of jam (I think fancy see-thru jelly is a dreadful waste) using Pomona's pectin but there's still some left.  What a high class problem.

I know of 7 different kinds of Ukrainian borshch.  I make mine with the standard vegetables and no meat or bones.  On Christmas eve there can be no meat products anyway.  I am interested in your tomato soup.  I use an old fashioned recipe where you first put the cooked onions thru a food mill.  Holy cow, is it tasty or what.

I wish you the best of luck (in absence of commercial storage facilities that's all we've got) with your beets and any other produce you have.   

[Beeherder]

 
The space under the stairs worked well last year for garlic and shallots hanging in reclaimed onion bags. Am doing the same again this year and so far the alliums all look good. I haven't ever produced enough onion to make it to storage but the smaller ones do well here.

I'll post the tomato soup recipe under a Cooking title about what to do with the end of season tomato abundance. Had that soup for dinner last night and lunch today. hmmmm good, Campbells never made anything this tasty.

I'll make something in a big batch of borshch with those 10 dark red beets in the refrigerator. Could you offer your favorite no meat recipe please?

[Horsea]

Borshch.  ????  (Beet Soup.) 

This soup contains no dairy product but some people like to add sweet or sour cream at the end.  I don't; it's v. good as is.

1.  Simmer the beets till almost tender.  I guess you know to leave a bit of the tops on.

2.  After they're cooked, take them  out of the now dark red water, put them aside & let them cool. 

3.  Save the dark red beet-cooking water.

4.  Choose all or some vegetables from the following list:

                                                              wax, green or pole beans, cut into little pcs.
                                                              onions, diced
                                                              cabbage, shredded
                                                              carrots
                                                              potato, diced
                                                              celery, minced
                                                              parsley root, small amount, minced, if you have.
                                                             
                                                             
5.  Sautee, in oil,  in a large pot, whichever of the above vegetables you would normally sautee.  Potatoes should be kept separate and not necessarily sauteed, but it's up to you.

6. After sauteeing is done, add lots of water + the leftover beetcooking water and simmer the vegetables till they are done.

While the vegetables are cooking, skin the beets, then shred or cut into thin strips.

Now you have a pot of vegetable soup cooked in dark red liquid.

Place the shredded beets into the pot of cooked vegetable soup. 

7.  FINISHING:  You will need: *pureed tomatoes or tomato juice, approx 3/4 C.
                                         *lemon juice or kvass (too late to start making it now!  )
                                         *fresh parsley, minced
                                         *salt & pepper
                                         *fresh dill
                                         *bit of sugar, optional.  (I always used a bit, tho.)
                                         *finely cut-up beet leaves or swiss chard leaves, if you have.  This is more for
                                            Spring or Summer Borshch.
                                         *1 clove of garlic, minced.

Add the above items to the vegetable-beet soup.  Fresh dill would come last.  Heat and simmer for a few minutes. Taste the soup and make the necessary adjustments of salt, tomato juice & lemon juice.   Then turn the heat off and just let the soup sit for a couple of hours for  maximum flavour.  Day #2 it's even better.

OPTIONAL:  cooked, fresh broad beans or cooked white beans added at the end of cooking.

Hope I've not left something out.  (I cook this soup with my eyes shut, so to speak.)  I guess you know to be real careful adding lemon juice - just 1/2 tsp at a time.  Nothing worse than oversour borshch.  This recipe freezes well.  I freeze mine in quart sealers.

There are as many borshch recipes as there are cooks.  This is not like making angel food cake.   

[Beeherder]

 

cooking is art

baking is chemistry

I'll be making this beet soup, hmmm sounds great I can't wait. Never knew I liked home made soups so much until just a few years ago. Always liked stews and gravies but soups, not until recently. Thank you for the offering. Please edit or make another post if you would like to add or suggest variations.

Beets are also new to me. Until a few years ago they were a never fresh seldom purchased sour pickle item. Thank you for expanding my pallette.

[Beeherder]

 
And the beet goes on, ...

This week from the CSA came 6 nice medium Golden Beets. Previous years I have used these in an oven Root Veggie Roast and they carmelize very nicely. Today I will start that beet soup because I also got a really nice green cabbage at the Farmer's Market and will use the outer leaves to makes stuffed cabbage leaves with a stuffing or something later in the week where I'll eat one serving, store one in frig and freeze any additional. I'll use those mongo red beets from my garden and some of the Italian beets to make the soup and maybe the small and medium reds, goldens, and some Italians will go on that roasting sheet.

Root Veggie Roast - drizzle EVOO on baking sheet/roasting pan (DO NOT COVER) cut everything to bite size pieces and put whatever you have that was grown as a root or tuber on the baking sheet, (beets, onions, potato, carrots, shallots, garlic, parsnips, rooted parsley, leeks, etc) coarse koser salt and coarse ground pepper to taste, Bake at 350 - 375 until done. Its OK to add big chunks of fresh chili peppers, savory herbs, and fresh tomatoes too especially if you plan to can it. This will stand alone, serve as a side dish, serve over pasta, freeze or even can if you're careful. Enjoy!

[Beeherder]

 

Horsea, that is one of the most beautiful soups I have ever made/had. Not only is it some kind of tasty that is just wonderful it is a colorful and festive holiday bowl of warm comfort. The bright red then green bits of beans floating around and the sweet of the beet/cabbage offset by the tart of the lemon is GRRRREAT!

I just couldn't bring myself to add the garlic and am not really sure what you mean by "FINISH". Next time I will use just a little less tomato but its great no matter what.

THANK YOU!!