Garden Bounty - The Story of Our Beets

Why is it so rewarding to garden?! 

First of all, if you don’t have your own little garden plot or pot of flowers & tomatoes, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?!  Spoiler Alert:  Gardening is SO REWARDING, because it is one of the few miracles in life that has a fairly predictable outcome!  You provide healthy soil, plant the seeds, add water & sunlight, and eventually you reap the rewards! 

Maybe it’s cheesy, but to watch something grow from nothing is ABSOLUTELY AMAZING to me!  To literally enjoy the fruits of my labor is magical!  I tend the little plot of land, and lug water cans to the seeds, day and night, hoping for a little sign of life, and one day my patience is rewarded with a tiny sprig of green popping it’s head out of the soil.  Then anxiously awaiting flowers or fruit, is equally annoying and fun!  “Grow Damnit,” indeed!

Sometimes, the challenge of attempting to grow something new is thrilling, like unraveling some mystery of nature.  Sometimes, the growing is rewarding enough.  Just to wander past the flowers in the garden or know that you finally succeeded at sprouting a new plant can spark joy.  But, THE HARVEST, is an entirely new level of satisfaction!  Not only did I watch something appear out of the dark depths of the underworld, and marvel as it grew mighty, but to taste the spoils of victory, is THE BEST!!  So to wage war with the elements of nature, and dare life to triumph, and then allow the glorious victory to go uncelebrated, seems like a crime, and indeed it is!  Sadly, we committed that exact crime a few years in a row. Maybe I should back up…

Years ago, when Tam and I grew our very own, and first garden, as young adults, we set out to grow more fodder for our newly procured juicer.  We were on a journey to eat healthier, but as previously mentioned, we were young, and also, NOT wealthy, so we wanted to save on our grocery bill, by growing things we could juice.  Thus began our adventure of growing beets. 

We grew our very first beets at my mom’s house in a tiny, raised garden bed inspired by Square Foot Gardening.  When the time came to harvest our first beets, we were so excited.  We tried many variations of juice recipes, but our favorite included ginger.  The beet juice was sweet and delicious, and healthy, so we were walking on cloud nine, congratulating ourselves for growing our own food.  Our space in our tiny square foot garden was very limited, and we stayed with my mom for 3 years while we saved up for our house.  As a result, we dreamed of the day when we could expand our garden.

We FINALLY, started our expanded square foot gardens at our own home, three years later, and of course, we got to work growing one of our favorite veggies to juice.  You guessed it, beets!  One of my favorite memories as amateur beet farmers (I use that term very loosely lol), includes our first born!  Because we still loved our beet juice, we often juiced our garden beets with store bought items, like: carrots, and ginger, with apples or pineapple, and, of course, we let our little lady, Cora try it too!  She ABSOLUTELY LOVED, the juices we made, and would come running in her little walker to get a sip, always proclaiming: “MMMMM!,” and eagerly awaiting a second sip!

While we experimented with many different juices and juiced some questionable veggies (let’s not discuss the taste of juiced dandelion 🤐), we never ventured beyond juicing when it came to our beets.  Though we were content with our arsenal of recipes, life became even more busy and hectic when we added a second kiddo to our family, and within four months of Ada’s arrival, we decided to become entrepreneurs, launching my in-home & online boutique. 

I will jump ahead to stay on track but suffice to say we spent MANY MANY hours learning about our new business, and working hard to help it grow, all while tending to our young family.  We made our best effort to keep our gardening dreams alive, but there were several summers of overgrown crops, and neglected sunburnt messes. 

During the early years with two littles, we would start off each spring with the old college try, but life would somehow keep us busy right when we needed to start seeds or tend to summer weeds.  While we still managed to grow some of our favorite items, they definitely had shorter growing seasons, and only the strong survived our passive attempts to garden.  By the end of each season the garden looked wild.  We would, usually, give up on the final harvests, as we grew busier and busier with the boutique in the early fall.  Still, we enjoyed sugar snap peas, tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, bell peppers, hot peppers, and on occasion, kale, and other greens.  We continued to grow our beloved beets, BUT SADLY, and almost, CRIMINALLY, we did absolutely nothing with them!  We just ran out of time, and steam to make any effort to cook them, and we weren’t juicing very often.

Rarely would many say this, BUT, cue, 2020 TO THE RESCUE, sort of…  As we all know the spring of 2020 brought MANY unexpected changes, and A LOT of unplanned free time!  Suddenly, all my spring events were canceled, and my online business slowed, my husband worked from home for weeks, and school was now reduced to a handful of worksheets to be completed at any hour of the day, while still donning our pjs.  We had to throw ourselves into something, for our own sanity, and as was true for many, our garden was the answer. 

Our garden was patiently waiting for our affection, all these years, so we planned to make up for lost time.  While, we toiled away, sprucing up unloved corners of our yard, adding new flower beds, and building a chicken coop, we still somehow managed to leave our poor beets to rot.  Honestly, I don’t recall the specific excuse over the last two years, maybe we spent so much time on the yard that we ran out of energy for the harvest, or the everchanging environment with school continuing at home, and job changes… Regardless the reason, we neglected our beautiful beets in our newly renovated garden, after spending months tending to them.  Tam and I, both, felt so guilty about it, but our pangs were eased by the fact that we could, AT LEAST, feed them to our new chicken friends who also joined our family in the summer of 2020.  At least our chicken girls, would convert them into eggs for us!  AT LEAST, they were not COMPLETELY going to waste.

When this past spring (April 2022) rolled around, Tam wanted to quit growing beets, since several seasons passed where they never made it out of the garden or were harvested only to return to the compost heap and end up as chicken treats, BUT I was determined to have a successful harvest, and try something new with our beets!  I couldn’t give up on such a productive crop.  We always had such HUGE AND GORGEOUS beets!  We just needed to make the extra effort to figure out what to do with them, besides juice them.

So at the beginning of May 2022, we prepared our Square Foot Garden Beds.  We lovingly placed beet seeds in 4 of our square foot grids, which should have yielded to 32 beets (a few didn’t come to fruition, but most grew strong & large).  I made some vague remarks to Tam, that we could make beet chips with them, we just needed to make the effort in a timely manner, when the harvest season arrived.  All the while, sort of expecting my vague plans to spur his enthusiasm and determination to begin the harvest, which would, in turn, set my own motivations into gear.  However, “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry,” as the saying goes.

Without fail, our beets were HUGE and GORGEOUS, yet again, and yet again, the Fall Season crept up on us with the usual hustle and bustle of a new school year, boutique events, and after school activities.  Our beets grew larger by the day, and most of our summer fruits and veggies had completed their cycle.  It would have been VERY easy to leave the beets in the dirt or pick them, and leave them sit around too long, eventually landing them in the chicken run.  BUT, as I walked past the garden one beautiful evening, and saw a giant red cap of a softball sized beet staring up at me, I remembered my Spring Determination, and vague promise to make chips or find new recipes for our beets.  So, I returned to the kitchen and immediately began scrolling for some delicious inspiration for our bountiful harvest.   

I left several internet tabs open on my phone, each one containing some recipe that sparked my interest: A few tabs held the secrets to several beet chips recipes, one for pickled beet salad, one for pickled red beet.  I was excited to try them all, but didn’t want to repeat mistakes of the past, by harvesting the beets without having the time to process and cook them immediately.  So, I left the tabs open as a reminder, and waited for an open weekend to get to work.

As fate would have it, Tam and I ended up on a special kid free date a few days after my recipe hunt, and part of that date included a delicious dinner at a new to us restaurant.  With beets on the brain, we were intrigued when we saw beet salad on the menu, so we decided to give it a try, accompanied by a delicious spicy salmon roll and a main course that I have already forgotten.  BUT, THAT SALAD, was AMAZING!!! It just melted in our mouth!  The balanced sweet, salty and early flavors, were, to die for, ESPECIALLY paired with our spicy salmon roll!  The cartoon lightbulb over my head, lite up, and I closely observed the few simple ingredients of this salad and realized that I had our FIRST PLAN for our Early Fall Harvest!

The Salad That Inspired Our 2022 Harvest

I tossed aside the complicated recipe that I found on the internet calling for pickled beets in the salad, and prepared for THE HARVEST, determined to replicate the fresh and delicious salad my taste buds, now, craved!  (Keep reading, the recipe is coming). 

There were just a few steps to accomplish and a few mysteries to unravel:  1. Harvest the beets, 2. Process the beets, 3. Figure out how to cook them, 4. Gather the simple beet salad ingredients, 5. Figure out how to make a vinaigrette dressing similar to the restaurant’s (I have never made vinaigrette before this salad).  This may all sound simple or silly to some experienced cooks, but I grew up with pickled red beet eggs, and no knowledge of how my grandmother made them.  My mom was the “tom boy,” and my grandfather’s shadow.  She knew how to dismantle an engine, and merely cooked for survival, not for joy.  So for me, as an adult, cooking anything beyond the basics, like spaghetti, is always a new adventure.  Some research and combining a few recipes, is my typical M.O., but this time, a little more experience under my belt, and careful observation of the flavors we enjoyed at the restaurant had me ready to conquer this meal!

1.    The Harvest – I got to work pulling up the gloriously deep red beets, each one emerging from the dirt, larger than the last.  Soon, I had a pile so large, I needed to fill a second basket.  I carefully untangled some entwined soil from the roots, and left it for next year’s crop, and returned to the kitchen with my beet baskets overflowing.

2.  & 3. Processing & Cooking The Beets - Processing the beets was much easier than I realized, however, there was one important lesson learned for the next harvest… This year, I returned to the kitchen to wash the beets one, by one in our sink, but it made for a GIANT MESS to clean up after, AND, it wasn’t the best idea for our plumbing.  So, to avoid scooping piles of dirt out of my sink, next year, I will fill some buckets with water and be sure to rinse the excess dirt from the roots and beet bulbs while still in the garden.  That way, I can simply dump the dirty water back into the garden and do one final rinse in the sink, afterwards.  Nonetheless, I cleaned the beets in the sink, and cut the greens and hair like roots from the bulbs and placed each one in a giant pot for boiling. *  After boiling the beets for 20-40 of minutes (until a fork or knife could pierce the largest beet), I let them cool just enough so that I could handle them.  The skin of the beets slid right off each one.  I set the beet skin aside for chicken scraps and compost fodder, and I got to work dicing up the beets into small, half inch cubes.  Just like that, the beets were ready for the big show!!

*A quick note here: I set the green beet leaves aside for use in another recipe, but ended up gifting them to our chicken ladies, since they very quickly wilted.  Another lesson learned for our next harvest!  I plan to refrigerate the greens, and be prepared with a recipe, so I can further explore how to get the most out of our beet harvest.  That is an adventure for another day!

4.Gathering the Ingredients – Time To Hit The Store!  Our simple beet salad at the restaurant consisted of beet cubes, onion, tomatoes, feta crumble, and fresh sprouts to garnish the top, drizzled with a vinaigrette, which inspired my plans, but I wanted to alter them a bit to experiment a little.  So, my shopping list included: Fresh Arugula, Alfalfa Sprouts, Green Onions, and Feta Cheese Crumble, and walnuts.

5.  The Dressing – Once, I gathered all of necessities at the store, I returned home to conquer the final task, before enjoying the fruits of my research and labor.  It turns out that vinaigrette dressing is quite simple, and the recipe is REALLY hard to mess up!  Did you know that?!  LOL, well I never made my own dressing before, and I wasn’t much of a fan of the vinaigrette flavor, before expanding my palate.  But, it just goes to show you, some things that seem fancy, are simple, and doable at home!  Here is the original recipe I used, by “cookieandkate.”  I altered the original recipe for what was readily available in my kitchen since I didn’t consider the dressing recipe when shopping for main salad items.

            Ingredients

·    ½ CUP extra-virgin olive oil

·    3 tablespoons vinegar of choice (balsamic, red wine, white wine

·    1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

·    1 tablespoon maple syrup or honey

·    2 medium cloves garlic (pressed or minced

·    ¼ teaspoon fine seas salt, to taste

·    Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

I chose apple cider vinegar, since I had a giant bottle of it, and spicy brown mustard from what was on hand. My garlic was dried up, so I skipped that ingredient, and hoped for the best (fingers crossed it would taste ok).  I also chose honey as the sweet addition to the dressing.  Otherwise, I added the olive oil, apple cider vinegar, spicy brown mustard, honey, and a hint of salt and pepper in a measuring cup, whisked it up, and gave it a little taste test!  It turned out to be delicious!

I felt like a showoff celebrity chef while preparing our side salad bowls.  First, I layered the cold cubed beets on top of a bed of baby arugula. Second, I added chopped walnuts, and sprinkled diced green onions on top.  Third, I crowned the salad with crumbled feta cheese and a pile of alfalfa sprouts.  Finally, I lightly drizzled the spicy mustard vinaigrette on top of the entire beautiful heap.  

The tanginess of the apple cider, and spiciness of the brown mustard were the perfect accompaniment to the sweet beets, savory green onions, crunch walnuts, and salty feta.  The entire salad was so fresh and delicious!  I seriously felt such an rewarding sense of accomplishment after completing my very first Garden To Table Meal!

In one Sunday, I researched how to prepare and make the beets, and dressing recipes, shopped for needed garnishments, and harvested, cleaned, cooked, and prepared a meal from our garden.  AND… the icing on top of this amazing feeling of productivity, self-sufficiency, self-discovery, experimentation, was the delicious treat that awaited our taste buds at the end of a long day.  While it did take the better part of my day, it was so rewarding, and I know that I will be faster and more efficient next year.  The funny thing is, we loved the beet salad so much, that we ended up using our ENTIRE harvest for the salad.  We ate it ALL week long as a side to our meals.  So, we have new recipes to adventure with next season, and for now, I have a favorite recipe to make throughout the winter, even if I have to “cheat” and use store bought beets.

            I can’t wait to try more Garden-To-Table recipes in the future and share them with you!  I also can’t wait to hear if you try our beet salad recipe!  I promise, if you are a beet lover, it is simple, and delicious, and the perfect side to almost any meal!  💜