Beets, Beets, Beets

I have always eaten beets from a can, and I like them. They turn my fingers pink, and taste sweet and earthy. Not to mention eating something straight out of the can is so easy and convenient. Except, I always feel so guilty for eating any food that comes in a package. It is sooooooooooooo wasteful.

So I bought beets at the farmers' market in part because my boyfriend who lives far away got some in a produce basket he receives weekly, and he hated them. I am determined to find a way to perfect the eating of beets so that he will love them. (He lives far away, so I was not a part of his initial experimentation with beets.) I also bought some carrots. It was a weekend for purchasing roots, I guess. I will probably cook up the beet leaves the same way I do Swiss chard. I'm not sure how I will cook the actual beets.

One plan is to shred a beet with some carrots to eat over salad.

I also plan to roast some beets with cumin, lime, and mint--as recommended by a recipe card I received from the farmers' market. I may post the recipe and more detail on how this adventure goes when I do it.

Finally, I am contemplating a good mole-fashioned deeper'n'ever-turinip'n'tater'n'beet-root pie. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you clearly never read Brian Jacques Redwall series as a child. I have made this long-monikered pie out of the Redwall Cookbook (the stories were originally written for blind children, so they feature a lot of food talk to engage alternate senses), but it didn't include beets in it. The beets were served on the side. I wonder if that's because of a conflict of flavors or an issue with color.

Regardless, once I have roasted a few beets and get a sense of how I can blend them with seasonings, I will probably tackle developing my own deeper'n'ever-turinip'n'tater'n'beet-root pie. The cookbook's version is pretty bland and required a lot of salt and pepper. Its carrot layer was definitely the best part, but there are no carrots in the name. I can't remember if they were in the description. I may or may not include carrots in my version. We shall see.

You should eat beets, too. I will argue that they are good for you because beet juice and beets were included in a colon cleanse I did with my mom a few years ago, though my friend Molly warns that eating raw beets in large quantities can be dangerous because it is a blood cleanser. She also overshared that your pee can turn pink. That's never happened to me as a result of eating canned beets, but I suppose my adventures in farmers' market beets my have a different result.

Desire to Clean, Bake, and Reference Redwall

I'm procrastinating. The paper I've been struggling with for two-and-a-half months would take me five years to adequately research. I'm starting a new paper today. Or, at least, I should be.

So far, I've swept the entire house, done some laundry and dishes, scrubbed the tub, read a couple articles that people's tweets led me to. Twitter is turning out to not be all bad. I just had to delete some of the publishing companies I was following who pay people to tweet all day. It was overwhelming.

I think I want to do some baking. My sister called me to ask me some cooking questions. She plays a great game where she calls me, tells me whats in her fridge, and then I advise her on what she can do with it. It's one of my favorite puzzles to solve. Recently, she's had some health issues that have required her to give up red meat, berries, caffeine, and other random stuff that she loves, so she was asking me about some pork seasonings. We talked about an apple curry glaze (ginger pear is good too). Yum! I also recommended she try Shrimp'N'Hotroot Soup, a Redwall delicacy from the otters.

If you haven't read Brian Jacques Redwall series, you might give it a try. I have a harder time getting into the series lately, but I was reading them from fourth grade up into my undergraduate career. They're animal fantasies set in a medieval environment with adventure, riddles, humor, well-written dialogue & dialects, great food, and a good dose of morality. I give them a great deal of credit for developing my vocabulary growing up. I used to pull out the dictionary all the time while reading them.

Anywho, Jacques initially wrote the first five books for blind children, which meant he often emphasized senses other than sight. Jacques wrote British dialects into the text, so his characters can really be heard. My favorites are the moles who speak as if they're from the West Country. Jacques based them off of the people of Sommerset. The hares are pretty great too. You'll just have to read to find out.

You'll also want to read to see how he writes about taste. The books are mouthwatering. There are always feasts, often with animal species signature dishes. They've come out with a cookbook to share the recipes with readers. I've tried Deeper'N'Ever Turnip'N'Tater'N'Beetroot pie from the moles. It was a bit bland--it is British--, but I think with some seasoning it would be great. I also tried the Hotroot soup, and that was wonderful and well seasoned. I do recommend browning some carrots, running them through a food processor, and throwing them in the pot too. Adds a nice touch.

If you don't want to buy the official cookbook (which includes a cute story for kids), try Redwall.net Kitchen. It's a web site of fan-made recipes.