Cooking beet roots and greens

[zeitoun]

I made a salad with blue cheese, arugula and sherry vinegar and EVOO dressing

Next time if I do this again I will serve it on a shallow platter and sprinkle the blue cheese on top.....

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Your salad looks wonderful.

I would highly recommend you try goat cheese instead of blue cheese as a pairing with beets next time, it really works great too and I personaly tend to prefer regular goat cheese over blue cheese in a beet salad...

I'm glad this experience made a convert out of you, I also grew up not liking beets until I first tasted homemade roasted beets, now I can't get enough of it!

[dockhl]

I just got a few lovely bunches of beets to roast and the greens are positively voluptuous ! Not quite 'baby' greensbut quite nice.

Can I braise these ? Worth doing?

[Jensen]

Cook them just like you would chard or you can make summer borscht from them. They're fabulous!

[dockhl]

Cook them just like you would chard or you can make summer borscht from them. They're fabulous!

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Thanks, Jensen. Do the greens taste like beets?

(I love beets ! Roasted with blue cheese and walnuts...... )

[sadistick]

sautee some garlic, shallots, in butter and EVOO - add some greens, a touch of water, sautee and season. enjoy. VERY healthy too!

[Jensen]

They're not exactly like beets (not as sweet) but you can taste that they are related.

[Abra]

What sadistick said, except that I like to put the lid on the pan and let them steam for 3-4 minutes after adding the splash of liquid, then remove it and toss the greens as the liquid evaporates. And of course a little pancetta never hurt anything!

[andiesenji]

I often use them instead of kale in soup with cannellini beans, browned sausage (bratwurst is my preferred type) and pasta. Not exactly Pasta e Fagiole but my version.

[ludja]

They would be great as a substitute for kale greens in Caldo Verde.

(I just made a pot with kale yesterday, but it is also very good with beet or mustard greens as well.) The stew uses a lot of greens, and once the soup is cooked, it reheats wonderfully for a few days. So it is a great way to use up and save greens for longer eating.

Edited March 12, 2006 by ludja (log)

[mizducky]

I adore beet greens--so much so that I evolved this recipe for a beet-and-greens borscht.

I like to use even the stems--they're not as tough as stems from other greens I can think of (collards, for instance), and harbor a bunch of flavor. So if you buy a bunch of beets with greens, you don't just get two vegetables for the price of one, but three.

[~cayenne~]

I just got a few lovely bunches of beets to roast and the greens are positively voluptuous ! Not quite 'baby' greensbut quite nice.

Can I braise these ? Worth doing?

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Oh, my goodness, I'm envious. I looooove beet greens. Steamed or quickly stir fried with garlic and enhanced with balsamic, they are much like kale, similiar to spinach. Experiment with them, they can be very delicious, don't toss them! ( I remember them from my youth, when they were abundant in my grandpa's garden. Now, hard to find. ) oh and they are healthy too!

[scubadoo97]

Beet greens are fantastic. Too bad they don't sell them in bunches with other greens. I love beets but hate to work with them due to the stain related issues.

[MelissaH]

Beet greens are fantastic.  Too bad they don't sell them in bunches with other greens.  I love beets but hate to work with them due to the stain related issues.

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I actually saw factory-sealed bags of beet greens at my local supermarket yesterday, right next to the bags of kale and collard greens! I don't remember the brand name on the box, but someone's heard you.

I usually chop the tops off, give them a good soak to get rid of the dirt, and steam. Meanwhile, I scrub the beets themselves, and bake them in a foil packet till they're done and the skins slip off. Then I slice the beets, and serve them with their greens and a bottle of vinegar. Yum!

I wish I could find golden beets in this area. Cuts down on the stain problem.

MelissaH

[markabauman]

Braise the greens, drain and squeeze out as much water as possible- mix with your choice of drained ricotta, chevre, parm, little nutmeg, etc. Use as a ravioli filling with beet pasta.

[loiosh]

If they're big leaves, chop off the stems (optionally, reserve them for another use...I ate some steamed ones marinated in soy and sesame oil, but that mightn't be to everyone's taste). Steam them until they're tender yet still hold their shape and stuff them like grape leaves. I like to prepare them in a way similar to a quinoa-stuffed swiss chard recipe a friend made years ago. The quinoa gets spiced and has some pine nuts and sultanas added in cooking, and the stuffed leaves are topped with a tomato sauce, also with sultanas and spices. Oh, here it is! Anyway, you could stuff them with almost any sort of seasoned, cooked grain.

[halloweencat]

a while back a friend served me a beet greens recipie from deborah madison. it was +so+ good i wanted to lick the plate (but refrained, out of guest-ish sensibilities, 'tho i told her of my impulse...she laughed ). 'tho i didn't lick the plate, i +certainly+ had seconds.

unfortunately, i cannot remember in which one of her cookbooks the recipie was...i'll ask (or perhaps someone on this thread might know).

cheers --

[Pontormo]

H-Cat:

You're probably thinking of a very labor-intensive recipe for canoli filled with beet greens with a walnut sauce. It's in the first book, appropriately, Greens.

One thing that is not mentioned in this or in the linked threads is how suitable beet greens are for gratins on their own or combined in layers with thinly sliced potatoes, carmelized onions, cooked rice...you name it.

I've got nearly two pounds of tender greens from baby beets, about of the third of the weight taken up by slender stems that Miz Ducky points out is really a third vegetable.

While it's almost a crime not to take advantage of their youth by serving them simply and quickly boiled, dried and in a salad topped with the roasted roots, I plan to cook greens and stems separately, the latter for longer. Chop them up. Below: the chopped greens with bechamel with a little grated cheese, the sauce flavored with a lightly crushed garlic clove. Above: the stalks treated as Italians sometimes do large, fleshy chard stalks in a gratin, only toss them with lots Parmigiano Reggiano and chunky bread crumbs coated with olive oil or butter.

Dinner with sausages, roasted chicken or crisp salad, fruit and nuts.

Another possibility would be to chop stems into 1 inch lengths and batter fry them. Serve with sage leaves treated the same way. Putting these on top of the gratin seems excessive.

Edited April 26, 2006 by Pontormo (log)

[Ann_T]

You could use them in this Greek Lamb dish. Substitute the Beet tops for the Chard. I've made this recipe using Chard as well as spinach.

[MissAmy]

My grandmother grew beets in her garden, and we always ate the greens. She did hers in the typical Southern way, which is what I do. Just cook up some bacon lardons, when the fat is rendered, throw in a little onion and garlic and saute, add the greens, a little water, salt and peper, they're done when they're wilted. Serve with cornbread. Comfort food nirvana, I tell you!

[gingerfreak]

Braised beet greens with garlic, olive oil and bacon are great as a pizza topping...soooo good with all that melted cheese. Karen Barnaby has a recipe for this in The Passionate Cook.

[rhinopias]

I blanch the beet greens, squeeze the excess water out, toss with roasted beets, orange segments, sweet onions, a red wine vinaigrette, and chill for one hour. Yum! Found this on Epicurious, and now I make it once a week.

[Pontormo]

One thing that is not mentioned in this or in the linked threads is how suitable beet greens are for gratins on their own or combined in layers with thinly sliced potatoes, carmelized onions, cooked rice...you name it.

I've got nearly two pounds of tender greens from baby beets, about of the third of the weight taken up by slender stems that Miz Ducky points out is really a third vegetable. 

While it's almost a crime not to take advantage of their youth by serving them simply and quickly boiled, dried and in a salad topped with the roasted roots, I plan to cook greens and stems separately, the latter for longer.  Chop them up.  Below: the chopped greens with bechamel with a little grated cheese, the sauce flavored with a lightly crushed garlic clove.  Above: the stalks treated as Italians sometimes do large, fleshy chard stalks in a gratin, only toss them with lots Parmigiano Reggiano and chunky bread crumbs coated with olive oil or butter. 

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I ended up making two separate gratins instead of placing a layer of stems over greens. Stems were simply seasoned and topped with butter and Parm; greens were topped with buttered crumbs. Both were absolutely delicious. I used Deborah Madison's recipe for a bechamel destined for gratins which I highly recommend. The milk is boiled with onion, crushed garlic and aromatics. Once roux is incorporated, it's simmered for a long time in a double boiler. All the flavors come through and really make the dish.

Edited April 27, 2006 by Pontormo (log)

[Forest]

Hi All,

Is it possible to pickle beets without sugar or fake sugar substitutes? If so, any suggestions/recipes? Can you use some kind of fruit juice as a substitute?

Thanks!

[scott123]

Fruit juice contains naturally occuring sugar. Or you attempting to avoid sugar in all forms or just refined sugar?

Although splenda doesn't provide the same preservative qualities of sugar, I'm pretty sure pickled beets have plenty of other preservatives, so splenda should work.

[kellycolorado]

I picked beets, carrots and turnips using the "root vegetable kimchi" recipe in Wild Fermentation by Sandor Katz and it came out just fine. No sugar, just lacto-fermentation with lots of ginger and chiles similar to a regular kimchi recipe.

yum. --Kelly