Hello and welcome to Organic Edible Garden... and Kitchen.
Our beetroot bed's doing really well and they're a size now we can use them as baby beets.
This week in the kitchen I'm using beetroot in both raw and cooked form in a great big salad that I'm topping with some of my macadamia ricotta.
Beetroot is a really versatile ingredient, much-loved by chefs and cooks for its heartiness and sweet flavour that it adds to dishes.
And as the moon's in the Last Quarter, we're going to do some garden maintenance.
We're going to check in on our leeks, our root crops and our brassicas.
And we're also going to show you how to keep your tools in tip-top condition.
And later on Nellie's going to be joining me to tell us the many beneficial properties of beetroot.
Let's grab some of these little guys. Okay.
Before we head off into the garden, we're just going to do a bit of maintenance on our tools.
Things like our niwashis, our spades and our grubbers really benefit from being sharp.
So we're going to get a sharpening stone and this is one made for axes but any one would be fine.
They've usually got a sharp, rough side on one and a smooth on the other.
It's really easy to sharpen these guys.
Like the spades, one side has a sharper angle than another.
This is usually going to be the flat side, that'll be the angled side.
And then just with the stone in a circular motion, on about a 45 degree angle, we're just going to give it a sharpen.
The next thing I'm going to do is I'm going to put some linseed oil on the handles of these tools.
These have been around a few generations and they're still going well, so I want to take care of them.
In this case, I'm putting boiled linseed on.
The difference between something like boiled linseed and the raw linseed is that raw linseed doesn't dry.
It's great for our pruning paste because it keeps it wet, but I don't want it to be sticky handles every time I touch them.
One of the most important things to remember is this rag.
Boiled linseed oil has an exothermic reaction and if I just screw up this rag and throw it in the corner, it can self-combust.
So what I generally like to do is put it in some water and just hang it on the washing line.
And after that, it should be fine.
Now that my trusty grubber is all good to go, I'm going to put it to good use.
I'm going to hill up these leeks.
And you can see there's even weeds growing among them, but it's not going to matter because I'm going to push the soil both ways and that will cover them anyway.
And the important thing for doing is that you can get long, white stems on your leeks which is the most tender part.
So even though I'm filling them to the top, this probably won't be enough and I might even introduce some more soil to it as they grow up.
There's a lot of food in this soil because I've added some organic chicken manure and things to it, so they should grow really quickly still.
This is our root crop bed that we put in a while ago and after we planted it, they just got slammed by heavy rains, but they seem to be recovering now.
But at this point in time, they're quite thick still, so what we want to do is we actually want to separate some out.
If we do this now, there'll be less root disturbance later.
We're just going to pull out every second or third one, so the roots have enough space to get bigger.
And unlike the radishes, the beetroot and swedes, they're still small, so I'm just going to leave them alone.
And lastly, we're going to take care of our brassicas which we planted a few weeks back.
The cabbage and caulis have been nibbled on the leaves and I'm going to do something about it.
So this week we're going to put a yeast trap in the garden to try and take care of the slugs.
And this is just made up of 2 teaspoons of white sugar and 2 teaspoons of dried yeast.
I've added some warm water to it and it's reacted now - the bubbles at the top.
I'm going to pour them into saucers that are pushed in to ground level and any slugs or snails will go into that before anything else.
And even though I've sprayed my brassicas when I planted them with some BT, the huge amount of rain we had has washed it off.
So I'm just going to give it another dose.
The great stuff about BT is it's a natural-forming fungus and you can do it in any weather.
Today I'm making a hearty beetroot dish which I'm pairing with buckwheat as it's winter now and I want to have some nice warming dishes.
But I also am using it in its raw form to keep it fresh and vibrant as well.
So I'm going to get started with the roasted beetroot.
So I've taken a baking tray and lined it with some baking paper.
So just put that to the side.
Now I'm going to take a couple of larger beets which I'm going to chop up.
I'll first peel them.
And we're going to chop them into sort of 2 centimetre to 3 centimetre wedges.
You want them to be of an even size so they all cook at the same time.
Or approximately.
I'm going to add a little bit of salt in there.
I've got some flaky salt there.
A little bit of balsamic vinegar.
Or you could use red wine vinegar.
Just whatever you have.
Some olive oil.
I've got some garlic - going to put 3 to 4 cloves in there.
So I'm just adding in some whole cloves of garlic - the whole cloves of garlic are really lovely in here as they are.
They'll sweeten up and become soft.
The last thing I'm going to add into here is some twigs of thyme.
Now it's quite nice to keep them whole 'cos we will remove them.
We're not going to pop the thyme in the salad. It's just to flavour up the beetroot.
So wrap that up into a parcel, any which way you can.
It doesn't need to be perfect.
I just don't want the oven heat coming straight onto the beetroot.
So this way, it will make it nice and tender and soft and almost steam it a little in there.
I'm putting them in the oven at around 180 degrees and cooking them for around 40 minutes.
So the next thing I'm going to do is make a macadamia feta cheese.
So we're going to take the blender.
You will need a good blender for this one. Or actually you can do it in a food processor as well.
And I'm going to place some soaked macadamias - now these have been soaked and rinsed really well.
And also some cashews that have been soaked and rinsed.
So I've only soaked these for around 2 hours.
OK, so next I'm going to add a little bit of water.
I'm trying to add as little water as I can.
I want this to be really thick and fluffy.
But I can add more as it's going so I'll just add a little to start with.
Then, importantly, in this recipe is salt.
So cheese is salty, so I'm going to add some salt in here.
And then some lemon juice.
And the important cheesy ingredient is some nutritional yeast.
Which is a great thing if you're vegetarian and vegan.
It's got lots of B vitamins in it.
And then I'm going to blend this.
I'm just going to check the texture now and give it a taste.
So if I rub 2 fingers together with the mixture there, I can tell if it's grainy or not.
So this is really nice and smooth.
I've blended this for around a minute now just to get it really super smooth and you can see in here also how thick it is, like it's a really thick creamy texture.
So now I'm going to take my baby beets here and I'm going to use the beet leaves as well.
So this is going to be our fresh raw beetroot in the dish.
OK, so I just need to clean these up.
I'll just pick through the leaves - some of them I can't use.
Some of them are a little hard and some of them are a little brown.
So just pick through some nice ones.
So I'll put those ones aside - that's going to be enough.
And I could save these ones for juice.
Now the beets need a little wash.
And a quick peel.
So I'm just chopping the ends off the beets then - the little hairy bits on the end.
And now I'm going to take my mandoline and finely slice these baby beets.
So I've just got them on a really low setting.
I want them nice and thin.
Beetroot's much nicer when it's finely sliced.
So I'm going to pop these beets in a little bowl.
Then we're going to start serving up this dish.
So I'm just going to get the beetroot out of the oven now.
They're looking great.
Really nice and tender - I'll just check them with a knife.
Perfect.
So I'm going to get some plates for serving.
So I'm going to start with some greens.
So I've got a mix here of kale and lettuce and some radicchio.
So just any greens that you have.
You want them to be a little hardy, as you're going to put some hot beetroot on top, so you don't want them to wilt too much.
Now I've got some of my beet leaves here.
Just going to scatter a few across here.
The next thing I need to get is the buckwheat that I've cooked.
So buckwheat is a really nutritious grain.
It's great for people who're gluten-free and it contains all your essential amino acids.
So for this buckwheat I've just lightly toasted it and cooked it with double the amount of water and for around 20 minutes.
So I'm going to pop a scattering of it - a few tablespoons.
It's kind of similar to pearl barley but with a sort of nuttier flavour.
Next I'm going to add the cooked beetroot and some of the garlic.
You can see that garlic is nice and caramelised.
It's actually delicious like that.
So I'll just give each person a few of those.
And then some of this cooked beetroot.
So now I'm going to add more of my raw ingredients.
I've got these lovely raw beets.
Scatter a few there.
And then some parsley.
So I'll pick those off.
I'm going to drizzle on some balsamic reduction.
So you make your own balsamic reduction by cooking it slowly down on a stove top.
You can also make a quick one using some coconut sugar and balsamic and cooking that down - it will thicken up really quickly.
Otherwise you can buy a beautiful aged balsamic which will have this sort of sticky delicious texture.
So I'm just going to drizzle a little bit on there of that.
And I'm going to top it with some hazelnuts.
And lastly some of our really yummy macadamia and cashew ricotta.
I'll add a few dollops of that on there.
So I've done this one as a fresh quick cheese.
Another option is actually fermenting it overnight.
So to do that, you just blend the nuts with the water and add a probiotic to it or Rejuvelac and leave that overnight to culture.
And then the next day add in the lemon juice and the nutritional yeast and salt.
And now a little fresh-grated pepper.
And we're done.
Mmm... that looks delicious. Are they both for me?
They are Nellie.
So beetroot is a significant vegetable as far as antioxidant support goes.
And one of the major antioxidants is a phytonutrient called Betalain.
And there's a significant loss of Betalain actually when you cook beetroot as opposed to having it raw or very lightly cooked.
So that's a good thing to do.
And Betalain is actually very important for detoxification in the body.
What it does, it actually triggers an enzymatic reaction in the liver detox pathways which actually neutralises and excretes toxins in the body.
Make sure you use the beetroot greens as well.
They're really great.
They're actually really high in Vitamin C and Vitamin A and calcium and magnesium.
And they're a great source of inorganic nitrates which, when eaten, convert it in the body to nitric oxide, which actually relaxes blood vessels and increases the flow of blood around the body.
And before exercise, a really good thing to do is have a beetroot juice because what that actually does is, it reduces the amount of oxygen used by the body and actually gets more energy to your muscles.
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