Beet-ing the cold

A vegetarian soup of sweet, earthy beets underlined with tangy tomato and chunky with potatoes and carrots.


Asked of me at the caf lunchtable - "Is that a container of Jello?"

Slightly more grown up than Jello but nonetheless a brilliant cherry red, borscht was what filled my little Pyrex container.

I'm a farmer's market junkie. I shop around for the deals, but also for the colours. Yellow tomatoes. Red swiss chard. Purple peppers. And beets! No other vegetable bleeds such a wonderful shade and in such copious amounts.


I had a large yoghurt tub filled with cooked sliced beets in the freezer from a beet risotto experiment following a farmer's market visit last fall. The slices had been steamed in the microwave with a small amount of water until a large amount of pink bubbles issued forth as the water boiled over (it washed off easily with water). Using these, I wanted to try a recipe from Allrecipes for a vegetarian borscht. I had never eaten borscht before, but my parents used to grow beets in our garden and make a Chinese-style beet soup, which was quite yummy.

Why had I put off this endeavour since the fall? Laziness - the recipe in its original form seemed a little tedious and cookware-consuming (I dislike doing dishes). So, last week I reviewed the recipe and decided that many of the steps and cookware seemed redundant. I decided I would use a single pot, first for sauteing and then a mass simmering. Everything would be added in diced form and then I would use my immersion blender to give it a quick puree, rather than separately mashing boiled potatoes for texture. One third cup of butter? Olive oil would suffice. Also, there would be no discarding of the beets after boiling them; this was to be an exercise in pink maximization.


Between the beets and the can of tomatoes, this soup was a great combination of sweet and sour. I added a tablespoon of miso paste for saltiness, but salt or vegetable bouillon would have worked equally well. I tried yoghurt on top the first time, but found that I preferred it plain with some black pepper. When I packed the soup for lunch, I sprinkled on some canned chickpeas, which absorbed enough colour by lunchtime to be a lovely light pink inside my dark pink soup.

Recipe:
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2-3 cloves garlic
- 1-2 onion, diced
- 3 cups finely shredded cabbage
- 6 cups water
- 2 carrots, sliced
- 1-2 beets, diced (2-3 cups)
- 1 large can tomatoes (~3 cups, I used pureed)
- 3-4 potatoes, diced
- 1 tbsp miso
- dried dill weed and freshly ground black pepper to taste

1. Heat oil in pan until shimmery.
   
2. Add onions and garlic. Saute until translucent.
   
3. Add cabbage to onions and keep stirring until soft.
   
4. Add the water and remainder of the vegetables.
   
5. Heat to boil and simmer until all vegetables are soft (about half an hour).
   
6. If you have an immersion blender, give everything a quick blend, leaving some chunks for texture. If you don't, try removing some of the solids and blending in an actual blender or mashing it in a separate pot.
   
7. Add miso, dill and ground pepper to taste. Alternatively, use salt or vegetable bouillon instead of miso.

Adding 1 cup more or less of any vegetables won't really hurt anything. Adding vegetables not listed probably can't hurt either; the original recipe had called for celery and green peppers which I didn't have around.