Pickled Beets with Stems, Leaves, Clementines and Blue Cheese
I saw a beautiful bunch of beets today at the store. The beets had nice leaves so I figured the beets might have been picked not too long back. Beets with live leaves usually taste much better and usually have a better texture so I brought them home.
Usually I only eat the beet greens in salads because they are bitter but today I cooked them up with the stems while I cooked the beets.
I cooked the beets with vintagers, sugar and a couple clementines to infuse another flavor into the beets.
The beets were very large and took 90 minutes covered in a 350 degree F oven. When the beets are cool enough to handle the skins just slip off.
While the beets were cooking I sautéed up celery, beet stems, onion, garlic and threw in the beet greens last.
Then the plate gets dressed up with toppings.
Pickled Beets with Stems, Leaves, Clementines and Blue Cheese
Ingredients for about 6 Servings
3 medium/large beets – with stems and fresh leaves for the rest of the recipe – washed well
1 cup red wine vinegar
1 cup rice wine vinegar
1 cup sugar
2 clementines – each cut in half
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
3 celery stalks – peeled and sliced
beet stems – from your beets – chopped
1/2 sweet onion – chopped
2 garlic cloves – ground up or mashed
1 Tablespoon kosher salt or sea salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
beet leaves – pulled off the stems in bit size pieces
2 small clementines
3 scallions greens sliced thin
3oz blue cheese – crumbled
6 dates – seeded – sliced thin
6 Tablespoons honey
3 oz almonds – toasted
6 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
fresh ground sea salt
Aleppo pepper
Directions
Set your oven to 350 degrees F
Get a large pan. Cut your beets in halves and place in pan.
2 clementines cut in half and add to pan along with-
red wine vinegar, rice wine vinegar, sugar
Cover the pan and cook until for tender. (one hour – 90 minutes depending on size of beets and oven.
In your fry pan on medium high heat add 2 Tablespoons olive oil, celery, beet stems, sweet onion, garlic, 1 Tablespoon salt, black pepper and cover loosely and cook till sweated (till all is soft). Now add beet leaves and cover. (this will cook fast) and lastly stir in the two clementines segments.
For serving slice the beets and serve about one half a beet per person.
Top the beets with a scoop of contents fro the fry pan.
Top each serving with scallions, blue cheese, dates, honey, extra virgin olive oil, toasted almonds, fresh ground sea salt and Aleppo pepper.
Enjoy!
Pickled Beets with Stems, Leaves, Clementines and Blue Cheese
Forking Yummy!
The Forking Truth
