I love the look of your salad, and the thought of beetroot and blackberries is a beautiful and intriguing one. I need to find some blackberries here...
From living in Russia, I learned to love beetroot in all guises, but especially with smoked fish and horseradish as you describe. I also loved it just tossed in sour cream with lots of dill and sometimes some walnuts. Though this might not pass your pwpto bismol test...
When I was growing up in the north east, beetroot sandwiches (pickled beetroot) were called pitman's beef, as they were popular with miners. Substantial, filling, but a lot cheaper than meat.
I’ve just put some beetroot on to cook. They were a mixed bunch, mostly medium to large so will cook on hp for 10 minutes and fast release. If the larger ones need longer I’ll give them a couple of extra minutes. Some of mine are going in an apple and beetroot salad but the rest I will use in the salad in your blog. Sounds great.
Yes to cooking root veg in the pressure cooker, which I have been doing thanks to your two excellent books Catherine. Just this week I cooked some black beans in the PC and had both beetroots and potatoes (whole) in a trivet over the beans and the whole lot cooked in 10 minutes at pressure, natural release. It's now the only way I cook sweet potatoes too - I enjoy them steamed more so than roasted, a similar fashion to the Japanese. Keep up the great work.
Wish I could like beetroot that at kohlrabi are the only veg i struggle with. I have a request for a future substack I love your thermos instagram posts although I'm often alarmed at the very short cook times! Given more people are having to go to the office and don't want to or can't afford the sandwich shops it would be useful for more than those of us that have to do a kids thermos during termtime.
I'm trying to eat more pulses and more interesting grains such as freekah. Although another interesting substack could be using pressure cooker for salads although maybe the lack of a summer means it's not needed this year!
Hi - yes the beetroot could be cooked in the tomato sauce but - you would need to peel and cut into wedges first and it would bleed a lot more into the curry which would end up a purplish brown colour. And yes, you could definitely use chickpeas in place of paneer.
This curry is spectacularly good. I ended up going shopping JUST to get paneer to follow the recipe (I added beetroot leaves as well as lots of spinach). I did boil the beetroot separately as per your suggestion, and I can see how this is a better idea. 100ml of water ended up being a tad too much in my Kuhn Rikon, so I reckon I'll reduce that next time - I added a spoonful of greek yogurt to thicken it, which didn't hurt. At any rate, we gobbled the lot up. Thank you again!
Thank you for the feedback! Yes, how much water you use really does depend on your tomatoes. Tinned tends to need more than fresh, for example but it isn’t a hard and fast reuse as tinned can be watery and fresh, denser. It also depends on the texture you want for your sauce.
Lovely newsletter C! My family just can’t manage to love beetroot although if it’s served with something creamy they’ll tolerate it. The curry sounds intriguing - perhaps they’d like that one. Also a lovely idea to cook a batch of grains at the start of the week and use it in all sorts. I go through phases of doing it and must get back to it. Xx
Thank you! You know the other thing I didn’t mention is that I also associate beetroot with Australia, based solely on a comment from my ex husband who lived in Sydney for a few years. He said that it was rare to find a sandwich that didn’t have sliced beetroot in it! Maybe that was a thing briefly in the early 90s?
OMG yes but in my experience the stuff from a tin - which actually I don’t mind. On sandwiches, but also A BURGER WITH THE LOT - which, if embraces fully, contains beetroot, pineapple, bacon, egg and the standard lettuce and tomato. My grandparents always served tinned beetroot with salad. Didn’t eat the proper ‘fancy’ stuff until very late in the day
I also noticed you hadn't covered beetroot in your book, but I worked it out..5 minutes, perfect and it's so satisfying to remove the skins. I hope you can get past your bright pink aversion. Having recently returned from Riga & Vinuis, pink soup is everywhere and it's become my favourite thing to make. It's so delicious, tangy and refreshing, and apart from the beetroot, (and boiling an egg for topping) no other cooking involved. Lithuania even has its own pink soup festival.
"It is summer, apparently". Yes! Wooly socks and fleece on here...
But beetroot are excelent and sadly has a poor rap. I just harvested a huge bunch from the garden: all were sizes ranging from 2oz to 2 lbs. I made a guess and processed largest first to smallest seqentially and they were all lovely and tender (even the monster one). I used to boil them before I started pressure cooking (BPC) and hubby would ask if I was boiling dirt. No issue with PC - another selling point! Just wear gloves to handle them and rinse the cutting board straight away.
I like to add them to green salads but they go off before we can eat it all, so I do a sweet pickle (have sugar, half vinegar, with a bit of candied ginger in the vinegar solution) and jar them up. Pickle-phobe hubby loves them - not too vinegary so hy don't overwhelm the greens. And I also made loads of borscht and freeze batches. This summer seems more of a hot soup summer to me...
Thanks! The blackberries are insane this year. Already around 5kg in and they just keep on coming. And everytime I go for a walk I can smell them! One of my favourite scents.
I love the look of your salad, and the thought of beetroot and blackberries is a beautiful and intriguing one. I need to find some blackberries here...
From living in Russia, I learned to love beetroot in all guises, but especially with smoked fish and horseradish as you describe. I also loved it just tossed in sour cream with lots of dill and sometimes some walnuts. Though this might not pass your pwpto bismol test...
When I was growing up in the north east, beetroot sandwiches (pickled beetroot) were called pitman's beef, as they were popular with miners. Substantial, filling, but a lot cheaper than meat.
I wish I could get some to you, Deb. I am making creme de mure, maybe I can send some along in September.
I could eat the beetroot and sour cream in a dark room or blindfolded. Or perhaps down a mine....
I’ve just put some beetroot on to cook. They were a mixed bunch, mostly medium to large so will cook on hp for 10 minutes and fast release. If the larger ones need longer I’ll give them a couple of extra minutes. Some of mine are going in an apple and beetroot salad but the rest I will use in the salad in your blog. Sounds great.
Yes to cooking root veg in the pressure cooker, which I have been doing thanks to your two excellent books Catherine. Just this week I cooked some black beans in the PC and had both beetroots and potatoes (whole) in a trivet over the beans and the whole lot cooked in 10 minutes at pressure, natural release. It's now the only way I cook sweet potatoes too - I enjoy them steamed more so than roasted, a similar fashion to the Japanese. Keep up the great work.
Wish I could like beetroot that at kohlrabi are the only veg i struggle with. I have a request for a future substack I love your thermos instagram posts although I'm often alarmed at the very short cook times! Given more people are having to go to the office and don't want to or can't afford the sandwich shops it would be useful for more than those of us that have to do a kids thermos during termtime.
Yes, very good point. What kind of thing do like to eat at lunch time?
I'm trying to eat more pulses and more interesting grains such as freekah. Although another interesting substack could be using pressure cooker for salads although maybe the lack of a summer means it's not needed this year!
Yes, that’s a plan and the weather is set to improve by the middle of next week!
This is a keeper for sure, and I'm looking forward to attempting that curry. Two questions:
Could the beetroot not be cooked with the tomato sauce?
And do you think this might work with chickpeas instead of paneer?
Thank you, Catherine!
Hi - yes the beetroot could be cooked in the tomato sauce but - you would need to peel and cut into wedges first and it would bleed a lot more into the curry which would end up a purplish brown colour. And yes, you could definitely use chickpeas in place of paneer.
This curry is spectacularly good. I ended up going shopping JUST to get paneer to follow the recipe (I added beetroot leaves as well as lots of spinach). I did boil the beetroot separately as per your suggestion, and I can see how this is a better idea. 100ml of water ended up being a tad too much in my Kuhn Rikon, so I reckon I'll reduce that next time - I added a spoonful of greek yogurt to thicken it, which didn't hurt. At any rate, we gobbled the lot up. Thank you again!
Thank you for the feedback! Yes, how much water you use really does depend on your tomatoes. Tinned tends to need more than fresh, for example but it isn’t a hard and fast reuse as tinned can be watery and fresh, denser. It also depends on the texture you want for your sauce.
Lovely newsletter C! My family just can’t manage to love beetroot although if it’s served with something creamy they’ll tolerate it. The curry sounds intriguing - perhaps they’d like that one. Also a lovely idea to cook a batch of grains at the start of the week and use it in all sorts. I go through phases of doing it and must get back to it. Xx
Thank you! You know the other thing I didn’t mention is that I also associate beetroot with Australia, based solely on a comment from my ex husband who lived in Sydney for a few years. He said that it was rare to find a sandwich that didn’t have sliced beetroot in it! Maybe that was a thing briefly in the early 90s?
OMG yes but in my experience the stuff from a tin - which actually I don’t mind. On sandwiches, but also A BURGER WITH THE LOT - which, if embraces fully, contains beetroot, pineapple, bacon, egg and the standard lettuce and tomato. My grandparents always served tinned beetroot with salad. Didn’t eat the proper ‘fancy’ stuff until very late in the day
That’s really interesting! I’ve never seen tinned beetroot. And I’m not sure about pineapple and beetroot together in a burger. Would try it though!
I also noticed you hadn't covered beetroot in your book, but I worked it out..5 minutes, perfect and it's so satisfying to remove the skins. I hope you can get past your bright pink aversion. Having recently returned from Riga & Vinuis, pink soup is everywhere and it's become my favourite thing to make. It's so delicious, tangy and refreshing, and apart from the beetroot, (and boiling an egg for topping) no other cooking involved. Lithuania even has its own pink soup festival.
I actually looked it up, being sure I had included it, and it wasn’t where I thought it was.
"It is summer, apparently". Yes! Wooly socks and fleece on here...
But beetroot are excelent and sadly has a poor rap. I just harvested a huge bunch from the garden: all were sizes ranging from 2oz to 2 lbs. I made a guess and processed largest first to smallest seqentially and they were all lovely and tender (even the monster one). I used to boil them before I started pressure cooking (BPC) and hubby would ask if I was boiling dirt. No issue with PC - another selling point! Just wear gloves to handle them and rinse the cutting board straight away.
I like to add them to green salads but they go off before we can eat it all, so I do a sweet pickle (have sugar, half vinegar, with a bit of candied ginger in the vinegar solution) and jar them up. Pickle-phobe hubby loves them - not too vinegary so hy don't overwhelm the greens. And I also made loads of borscht and freeze batches. This summer seems more of a hot soup summer to me...
Yes, we had chicken soup last night...
Lovely suggestions. Very taken by the blackberry idea - have spotted that they're starting to ripen near me so must get picking!
Thanks! The blackberries are insane this year. Already around 5kg in and they just keep on coming. And everytime I go for a walk I can smell them! One of my favourite scents.