Beet Salad

Beet Salad

Something that my mother-in-law loves to cook with is beets.  She boils them, roasts them and pickles them.  She'll add them to a soup or a salad.  She can do just about anything with a beet.

My favourite is a beet salad.  Especially in the summer.  It's so easy to make and I usually prepare this salad in advance and refrigerate until ready to serve.

The only downfall to working with beets is that they stain your hands and clothes, so I recommend wearing an apron and wearing gloves while handling this root vegetable.  I also recommend eating organic beets since they grow underground.

Beet Consommé or Cream of Beet Soup

Beet Consomme

This consommé is generally made at Christmas time and eaten with ear shaped noodles stuffed with mushrooms that are collected in the woods over summer.  The mushrooms then get strung and hung to dry until they're ready for use in the winter.  

The preparation of these mushrooms is very time consuming.  After the drying process, they need to be boiled, drained, grinded into small pieces, seasoned and mixed with tiny pieces of onions.  Since the mushrooms are so flavourful, the juice from boiling the mushrooms is reserved for the beet soup.

These noodles are called Ooshkee, which is the Ukrainian word for ears.  Noodles are prepared on the side and then added to the consommé.  My husband tends to break his ooshkee up with his spoon in order to give his bowl extra flavour from the spicy mushroom filling.  

Add a splash of cream to your bowl and watch the soup turn pink.

I tend to make this soup without the mushrooms over the summer as beets become seasonal.  I puree all the ingredients together while still in the pot and add some cream.  This makes for a tasty Cream of Beet Soup.

Borscht

Borscht

Borscht is another classic Ukrainian soup.  This is a hearty soup recipe that should be eaten as a meal.  There are many versions of this soup and I have several to share over time. 

Once again, be sure to buy your beets organic.  They grow underground and you may want to avoid the heavy metals from within the soil.

Beets can be very messy and will stain your hands.  My secret is wearing surgical gloves while peeling and grating the beets.  No more red hands for me.

This recipe calls for canned beans, which I will avoid adding if I don't have time to pre-boil a cup of beans prior to making this soup.  Normally, I choose to skip out on an ingredient rather than use something that has been sitting in an aluminum can.  

*Fresh summer beets can be boiled with its skin on and once cooled, peel and freeze as a whole.

Cabbage & Tomato Soup with a Beet

Cabbage & Tomato Soup

Cabbage is very popular in Ukrainian cooking, which is a part of my husband's heritage.  My mother-in-law makes a variety of soups using cabbage, as it's common for Ukrainians to either start a meal with a light soup or eat a hearty soup as a meal on its own.  

I am very adamant about buying organic vegetables, especially the ones that grow underground.  Root vegetables such as onions and carrots are always organic in my home, as I do as much as I possibly can to avoid cooking foods with heavy metals.

It's RARE you will see me use canned foods even though they're listed in my recipes.  I will use a glass jar of Passat before using a can of tomatoes.  Only in rare circumstances will I use canned tomatoes, beans, etc.  You will never see me cook with aluminum pots and pans.  I only use stainless steel, cast iron, or glass baking dishes and line my cookie sheets with parchment paper.

While shopping at Loblaws last week, I was able to pick up a larger variety of organic vegetables.  They have such a great layout and make it so easy to find their organic foods between their purple markers.  The cost of their organics is so much more reasonable compared to the other grocery stores in my neighbourhood.  

I only buy fruits and vegetables between the purple markers at Loblaws and base my meals on what I'm able to find.  Some weeks there's such a vast variety of organics and some weeks this section is scarce.  Last week, I was lucky and for this reason will be cooking a lot of vegetable soups this week.