БОРЩ BORSCHT BLUNDER

I love beets, I love pickled beets, I love cold boiled beets, I love shredded raw beets in salad, I love roasted beets with goats cheese...I love the colour, I love the texture, I love the taste. There are so many fantastic beet recipes in my cookbooks waiting to be discovered, the problem....the beet is usually a side, a compliment to a main...for something that takes a heck of a lot of time to prepare and cook it doesn't seem to have had its proper dues. 

After the sucess of the Beetroot Relish on Monday I was itching to get stuck into my next beetroot adventure.  Donning my University of Arizona BURGUNDY coloured t-shirt (a gift from my brother) and my yellow rubber gloves I was ready to attack the last 1.5 lbs of beets lurking in the crisper drawer.  What better for a cold miserable winter's day than BORSCHT?! I have never made Borscht myself, but my friend used to make an Austrian version which she served with pasta dumplings...it is more like a beetroot bouillon with pasta....yummy but not the hearty root vegetable meal I imagine Northern Russians serving up. 

The recipe I used came from the Riverford Organics Website, which you can find here.  Of the ten or so recipes I looked at on-line and the one from my Canadian Classics cookbook this was the easiest, and what I thought to be the most beetroot-based version.  The longest part of the process is, of course, the boiling and peeling of the beets.

But, once that tediousness is over (and rubber gloves well and truly purpley) it takes no longer than half an hour to cook the soup.  Pretty simple so far? Where does this so-called "borscht blunder" come in, you ask?

I say it was a BLUNDER more than being an INICIDENT or ACCIDENT or, even worse, a DISASTER...but it certainly instigated a "DINNER IS RUINED" moment.  I will admit, in hindsight, that my reaction was actually based in ignorance. 

Ok enough of a build up....So in my head I thought, make the soup and then...puree it....right? cause that's how I thought Boscht was served.....ALWAYS....with a nice swirl of sour cream....

So I let the soup cool down a bit, and then got out my ingenious handheld blender.  And then....then....then...

WHIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR CLUNK CLUNK CLUNK

The blender just stopped!!  David came in and had a go....wouldn't work....tried a different outlet....wouldn't work...CHANGED THE FUSE...wouldn't work...IT WAS BUSTED! I totally thought dinner was ruined.  The Borscht wasn't pureed therefore dinner was ruined.  I got the potato masher and had a go at mashing by hand...but hey! Beetroot certainly isn't that soft EVER (but the potato in the soup was....so that was ok).

Defeated, I served the uber chunky borscht and David and I ate in our cold dining room by the dim light of the Christmas tree....all we needed was some Vodka to get the atmosphere right (ok....maybe the tree lights should really be candels on the tables...)

The soup was actually really nice, once you got over the large chunks of beetroot.  After dinner I did some further research on the internet and discovered that a chunky borscht is certainly more authentic than a pureed one anyway...Looking back, if I had cut the beets up smaller everything would have been fine sans blender. 

This morning two great things happened...first I realised there is no more beetroot in my crisper drawer (until tomorrow's delivery) and second I took the blender back to the shop and got a full refund! I then took my money and went to a different store and bought a different blender....so fingers crossed!

And....if today couldn't get any better....IT IS SNOW FLURRYING HERE IN CHELMSFORD!

Nearly-dead Apple Cake

Every other Thursday is like Christmas at our house. Eagerly I wait for our fantastic veggie box to be delivered. Usually I am home and Dave, the veggie man, hands over the goods with a smile and tip of his hat....no not really a tip of his hat, but I like to imagine that 50 years ago he may have! Anyway, yesterday I ended up having to run a few errands around the time that Dave usually visits and so when I arrived home to find my box sitting by the door just WAITING for me I literally jumped for joy. Is it sad that I get so much joy from the sight of beautiful produce picked just for me? I think I can live with the stigma.

The only downside of the box, or of mass vegetable buying in general, is the ritual cleaning out of the crisper drawers and fridge shelves before anything can be put in. It isn't really all that bad, I mean we tend to use up every shred of veg before the fortnight is up (I ration very strictly...thank you Dad and your love of military history and films) and so usually the most I have to do is brush down the shelves and tip out any dirt from the crisper drawer.

This week, however, I found....lurking...in the back of the drawer.....3 slightly soft and definitely "floury" apples. GAK! Two thoughts immediately sprang to mind: 1) When did I buy these? and 2) do I have enough eggs to make a cake?

Thankfully I did!!! (I never managed to answer number 1!)

My mum makes a fabulous apple cake that she calls DEAD APPLE CAKE, because...you guessed it...it uses dead apples. Not brown and rotten and fuzzy dead apples, but those nearing death. In fact the cake should more accurately be called NEARLY DEAD APPLE CAKE (think Nearly-headless-Nick from the HP series). Originally the recipe came from my Nonna who was given the recipe from a Jewish lady whose home she used to clean waaaaaay back when. When I was growing up my Nonna made all sorts of recipes inherited from those Jewish families and I just used to think that it was Italian food, cause she was Italian.





Anyway, this cake is moist and sweet and even better...freezes well. The apples are sliced thinly and then covered in sugar and cinnamon to get some flavour and then layered in between a spongy orange flavoured batter. It is a cinch to make and tastes fab!

Chocolate marrow loaf OH MY!

I was very surprised to find a GIGANTIC marrow in my vegetable box last week. It was a substitute...for Pak Choi....not a proper substitute in my books, but obviously the overflow of marrow at the farm was the clear choice to add into the box. For me, it was not a welcome addition. We had had one two weeks previously and it took about 7 meals to eat through the whole thing!

Luckily David asked me to make some baked goods for a market stall his unit is running for the council at some fair thing tomorrow. ding ding ding!!!!! my mum makes the most amazing moist chocolate loaf that has zucchini in it, and so...tick tick tick (went my brain) surely in this case my gigantic marrow can be used instead of zucchini....mix mix mix, grate grate grate, bake bake bake...

Et voila

from this:

to this:

5 a day

Living the life of an urban housewife in a town that is too large to really be a town and too small to actually be a city is sometimes difficult. The conscious (and slightly economical) decision to not own a car has made it even more difficult to be satisfied with my weekly shop! Chelmsford has few options open to the environmentally and economically aware housewife. As a town it has outgrown it's country-side feel. The town centre heaves with high street shops, brand names coffee shops, restaurant chains and fast food stops, the small covered market is a mixture of food and goods and sadly leaves much to be desired.

I do not mean to look down my nose at what is available in my new town I have chosen to purchase my meat at the butcher in the market because I do believe in supporting my local producers/purveyors, but I find myself regularly disappointed in their run-of-the-mill selection. The same goes for the fishmonger, who rarely stocks raw prawns!

There is something coined a Gourmet Market which takes place on Fridays and Saturdays in the town centre. Unlike a proper farmers market with it's rustic veggies and stalls of homemade preserves and baked goods, this gourmet market is more an extension of a food hall. Sausages, burgers and Indian take away is available with a large whole-sale fruit and veggie man taking over nearly half the space.

For two reasons: a) interest in supporting local farmers, and b) no transport, David and I have decided to have an organic vegetable box delivered once a fortnight. Joining this scheme has changed my life! Every other Thursday afternoon we are brought a box of 10 vegetables from Sacrewell Farm (part of the Riverford Organics group of farms). The box means that we are now cooking with seasonal vegetables (although I haven't completely stopped picking up the odd addition like spring onions or avocados) and more importantly I am planning my meals ahead of time, saving me more money at the grocer. Were we not on such a tight budget we would more than likely have a box delivered every week.

I urge you to investigate schemes in your local area. The cost may be a bit more than you would spend at a big grocery chain, but it the quality and the variety is worth it!