Dark Days: Beet Salad with Arugula and Pickled Red Onion

Our recent beet harvest yielded about seven pounds, but since these beets were first planted last August I was anxious to see if they were actually edible.

The beet greens, braised with garlic, shallots and red wine, yielded a delicious lunch earlier in the week. I cooked the beets yesterday in batches in a large pot of water, leaving the root and some of the stem intact.

From the boiling water they went directly into a cold water bath. The skins slipped off easily. I cut the beets into wedges. Now to taste.

The verdict? Not bad. A wee bit chewier than you would normally hope, but sweet and quite edible, especially for beets that had been in the ground for seven months. We are learning lots lately about how things overwinter in our kitchen garden here in the District of Columbia.

We decided these beets would be good candidates for pickling, but I put a few aside for dinner. I made quick pickles of some red onions. (See below). I tossed the beets and pickled onions with overwintered arugula from the garden and some blue goat's milk cheese, then dressed everything with a simple honey-mustard vinaigrette.

Now that spring is here, the arugula is desperate to go to seed. The seed stems seem to rise overnight. But that's fine with us. Along with the peppery leaves, the buds and flowers are great for spicing up a salad.

To pickle a batch of red onions, peel and cut two red onions in half lengthwise, then slice the halves into thin crescents. Put these in a bowl and cover with four cups of boiling water. Let stand 5 to 10 minutes, then drain in a colander.

In the same bowl, mix together a marinade of 1/2 cup cider vinegar, 1/2 cup water, two tablespoons honey, 1 teaspoon black peppercorns and 1 teaspoon whole cloves. Return the onions to the bowl, mix and let stand for about 4 hours, tossing the onions in the marinade occasionally.

The onions are best chilled before using. Or pack them into 2 pint-sized canning jars with the marinade and store in the refrigerator.

Lunch: Arugula With Honeybell Orange

A Ziploc bag of arugula arrived with our CSA box last Thursday and I am determined not to let it go to waste. Sometimes it's hard to keep up with the produce arriving from the far. It goes back into the cold room--out of sight, out of mind.

We also are down to the last of our season's Honeybell oranges. We love these huge oranges for the immense, sweet flavor and juiciness. But now I wonder, are they politically correct in the new food paradigm? I mean, individual boxes of oranges being shipped hither and yon from the Florida grower, rather than traveling in one trailor-load to the supermarket distribution center?

Simply dress the arugula with a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil, then a spritz of lemon juice. Season with coarse salt and black pepper. Toss with Honeyell orange sections.

Preparation time: 5 minutes.

Shopping: none

I happen to like the peppery, cold-hardy arugula we get from our farmer friend Brett. But if you don't happen to have any on hand, just substitute the lettuce that's sitting in your crisper drawer.

Foraged Salad for Breakfast

You never know what delights you might come across messing in the garden.

Today is supposed to be one of the hottest of the summer so I was out early weeding. The bed where I have been growing beets was mostly overrun with crabgrass. And I should say I've been completely derelict about harvesting those beets, but that's another story coming up soon.

I want to get this bed ready for planting salad and other greens for the fall. So it was time to do a little digging with the forked spade and get down on all fours to get my hands dirty. The spade sinks easily into the soil. We've had a fair amount of rain lately, which makes weeding all the more easy. I grab clumps of grass and they come up with great root balls. Shake them vigorously and knock them against the ground to remove all that rich soil and save it for the garden.

In the process, I uncovered a lovely bunch of arugula--a complete surprise, since the arugula I planted in the spring bolted back in May. I hate to be without arugula in the garden, so this was a great find. I set it aside. Then, not too much later, I pulled up a handful of perfectly happy mizzuna, hidden in the grasses. Only my love for arugula surpasses my feelings for mizzuna. Its peppery bite is a flavorful addition to salads, so I set that aside as well.

Plunge spade, grab weeds, throw weeds in bucket for compost pile--I was moving right along. Then I noticed one, then two, then three clumps of purslane. Purslane is a succulent with redish stems and clusters of small round leaves. It grows like a weed around the garden or sometimes out of cracks in the sidewalk. It is edible, and just recently I learned that purslane is the number one source of Omega-3 fatty acids among green leafy vegetables, those being the same heart-healthy Omega-3s that are so sought after in fatty fish such as salmon.


Personally, I think purslane is an acquired taste. The flavor is mild and somewhat citrusy, but the texture can be mucilaginous and off-putting. I can't stomach it cooked (give me okra any day). But I was confident it would blend nicely in a salad with the stronger tasting arugula and mizzuna, and then I'd have the benefit of all those fatty acids, as well as the many vitamins purslane confers: A, C and E, plus potassium, calcium and iron.

By the time I'd finished weeding, I thought I had the beginnings of breakfast. A nice plump carrot had offered itself during my digging. I cleaned that and ran it through the mandoline for julienne. I also had some yellow cherry tomatoes picked a couple of days ago, a few cooked green beans stashed in the fridge, and part of a loaf of rustic bread that I turned into cubes.

So here was the finished salad, foraged fresh from the garden: arugula and mizzuna leaves, purslane, julienned carrots, cherry tomatoes, green beans, rustic bread. Drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil, lemon juice and a bit of rice vinegar. Season with course salt and freshly ground black pepper. Some goat cheese or grated parmesan would work nicely as well.

Bolting Arugula & Tat Soi: A Crazy Salad

Sometimes the garden doesn't give you much choice for dinner. There are some things that just have to be eaten now.


So it is with the greens that overwintered from last fall's plantings. The tat soi and the arugula are both flowering, getting ready to seed. These bolting plants need to be cut and eaten before the seed-setting process turns them bitter.


I don't mind being pressed into a crazy, bolting salad. In fact, I love the sharp, peppery flavor of the arugula. The tat soi is much milder, like broccoli. Just cut the plants at the base and strip the leaves off the stems. Keep the flowers and buds: they look great in a salad and they're all edible.


You could mix these with other salad greens, slice some mushrooms, maybe some hothouse cherry tomatoes, red onion. I like to add sectioned oranges for a bit of sweetness and visual interest and shaved Parmesan cheese for depth and that wonderful parmesan mouth feel.

You can dress the salad with your favorite vinaigrette. For me, a squeeze of lemon juice, some quality extra-virgin olive oil, salt and pepper, is perfectly sufficient.


Simple. Delicious. Fresh.


And right from the garden.