Sunday, March 2, 2008

Harvard Beets...

I cooked on my own tonight, as Debbie is a million miles away at that agility meet. Usually when she's gone I just scrounge my meals from whatever we happen to have lying about. But for some reason yesterday I went grocery shopping for some simple treats. Tonight I had some excellent sausage and boiled cabbage as a main course. I had picked up some lovely fresh beets, and decided to make a dish I'd never made before: Harvard beets. When I was a kid it was a favorite, but I've had it only rarely since then.

I could guess (from the flavor and texture) most of the ingredients other than beets: sugar, vinegar, and cornstarch. But one ingredient I don't think I'd ever have guessed – cloves. And the salt was a bit unexpected as well.

Cleaning and dicing the beets was a bit of a chore, but the sauce was easy. The recipe calls for making the sauce in the top of a double-boiler, but I used a small saucepan over extremely low heat, and this worked just fine. And what a treat the result was! The fresh beets had that wonderful earthy aroma and flavor, and the sweet-and-sour sauce was exactly as I remembered it, and a perfect complement. Now I'm barely able to move, stuffed with such excellent food. And it was so easy to do!

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