Cold Pickled Beet Borsch
for a hot summer
day!
It’s the first week in August, 2007 in Marion, Ohio and it is hot. What better time for cold pickled beet soup with a sandwich.
Karen
Lipman on findarticles.com taught us a good way to start by making a simple batch of beets. She instructs
that the beets can be enjoyed as pickles, or for a quick borscht, in a salad or in a relish. We will concentrate on making
the pickled beets and the borscht, which we found to be easy and delightful to the taste.
Fresh Pickled Beets
Ingredients:
4 small diameter (about 2 ½ inches) beets (untrimmed about 1 ½
pounds)
1 ½ cups water
¼ cup red wine vinegar
2
tablespoons sugar
Instructions:
Trim tops and roots from beets (the leaves
are good and useful, more on that later)
Peel beets (you
can also used canned beets – no big revelation)
In a two quart sauce pan combine water, vinegar and sugar and bring to a boil.
Add beets, simmer covered for about 30
to 45 minutes or until tender. Turn beets often during the simmer.
Cool, cover and chill – the beets are good up to three days and yield about
¾ pounds of pickled beets.
Creamy Beet Borscht
Ingredients:
About 1 ½ pounds (a double batch of the Fresh Pickled Beets)
1 quart nonfat yogurt
1cup regular strength
chicken broth
Pepper to taste
Dill for garnish
Additional yogurt for garnish
Instructions:
Drain beets and reserve 1 ½ cups
juice
Combine
beets, reserved juice, 1 quart of yogurt and broth.
In a food processor or blender make a smooth puree (using about 1/3 of the beet mixture at
a time).
Chill
and serve cold (cover and chill up to one day)
Garnish with chopped dill. Offer yogurt and pepper to taste. Serves 6 to 8.
This makes an excellent and quick refreshing
soup.
However,
it’s too hot to cook! So do this.
Use a jar or two of Aunt Nellie’s Whole or Sliced Pickled Beets which you have on the
shelf for just this occasion. For a change of basic recipe this comes from culinary.net.
Easiest soup there is.
A recipe for Chilled Pickled Beet Borscht
Ingredients:
1 jar (16 ounces) Aunt Nellie’s
Whole or Sliced Pickled Beets
1 cup water
½
cup shredded carrots (optional)
2 tablespoons lemonade concentrate
1 cup buttermilk
2 tablespoons chopped
fresh dill
Salt and Pepper to taste
Sour
cream and chopped cucumber for garnish (optional, but not really)
Instructions:
Drain beets and reserve liquid
Chop beets
Combine reserved liquid, water, beets, carrots, and lemonade concentrate in medium
sauce pan. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, covered about 5 minutes to blend flavors and until carrots and tender.
Chill
Stir in buttermilk and dill, season with
salt and pepper.
Keep chilled (up to a day) until ready to serve. Top servings with sour cream and chopped cucumber.
Makes 4 servings
Easy
and Good! To tell the truth I liked Aunt Nellie's pickled beets out of a jar better than those I made. Maybe it's because
I don't know much about the art of making pickles.
David
