October 11th: Balsamic Beets, Curry Squash

Working our way through the waning farm veggies, and I'm happy to have a reason to cook my favourite beet recipe, from Eat, Shrink and Be Merry:

These Beets Were Made for Walkin' (Roasted Beets & Shallots with Balsamic Vinegar)

6 medium-sized whole fresh beets, about 1 1/2 lbs/680 g

12 small to medium-sized shallots, peeled (I used onions, since that what I had, and cooked them a bit longer)

1 tbsp olive oil

2 tsp minced fresh thyme (or 1/2 tsp dried, whatever's handy)

1 tsp balsamic vinegar (or more, to taste)

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 425°F. Wrap beets individually in foil. Place on middle oven rack and roast for about 1 hour, until beets are tender (you can pierce them with a fork), but not soft. Exact roasting time will depend on the size of the beets.

While beets are roasting, prepare shallots. Place peeled shallots in an 8 x 8-inch baking pan. Add olive oil and thyme and toss to coat. Set aside.

When beets are finished roasting, remove from oven and place pan of shallots in oven. Unwrap beets and let cook while shallots are roasting. Roast shallots for 15 minutes, stirring once, halfway through cooking time.

When beets are cool enough to handle, peel them. If you cut off the stem end, the skin should come off very easily. Slice each beet into six wedges. Place in serving bowl. Add hot shallots and any olive oil and thyme you can scrape from the pan (using a rubber spatula helps). Sprinkle with balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper and toss lightly. Serve hot.

Makes 6 servings.

To accompany, a re-try from last year, from October 2010's Chatelaine: Sweet & Spicy Squash. I don't know that I'll ever love love squash, but this was pretty tasty, and when you're trying to work your way through a lot of squash, as I am, this is not a bad way to go.

In total, the meal consisted of the beets, squash, boiled carrots, fried green tomatoes and fried mushrooms (this last being the only item not from the farm - not bad for a local + vegetarian meal!).

September 21st: roasted beet and clementine salad

I was debating whether or not to write about this one - I didn't keep the recipe - but it was pretty good, so I decided to go with it. I loved the beets, Olivia loved the oranges, but nobody loved it enough to bother cooking it again. Greg didn't have any; he wasn't home the night we ate this. From October 2011's Chatelaine: roasted beet and clementine salad. When I searched "beet salad" on the Chatelaine website, it came back with 14 hits, so there may be another gem on the list.

To accompany, I made, from October 2011's Chatelaine: spaghetti squash with cranberries, which neither Olivia nor I enjoyed. Definitely a recipe to toss.

September 11th: pancakes, ribs, beets, cookies - it must be Saturday!

Early morning rush. You know the type. Need to get the kid somewhere early, awake, fed, dressed and with hair brushed. Oh, and you need to be all those things too. Well, I don't know about these mornings. My workday mornings are all about me getting me ready while G&O snooze til all hours. Yes, I can get myself out the door with relative ease, but ask me to get O ready too? Oh dear.

Olivia started gymnastics this morning. Every Saturday, 8:30 a.m., from now til Christmas. And I am on my own since Greg runs Saturday mornings with the Running Room. On the plus side, if there is one thing I am good at, it is meal forethought. So back in August, I cooked up a big batch of pancakes, froze the leftovers, and now O's meal-in-the-car-on-the-way-to-gymnastics is one Banana Oatmeal Pancake warmed up in the toaster. She loves it and it is the only pancake recipe I have that is both delicious and relatively healthy. This one has been in our keeper book for awhile, and comes from a 2008 Holiday Chatelaine. (Sorry, no picture.)

Tonight's dinner came from September 2010's Today's Parent: Oven-Braised Short Ribs with Cinnamon and Molasses and from September 2010's Chatelaine: Roasted Beets and their Greens. The ribs I am not recommending, as the sweet potatoes did not cook, although I cut them to the size suggested, and cooked them as directed, and then longer. When my kid is waiting til 7:00 p.m. to eat supper, we both want the sweet potatoes done NOW, not in another ten minutes' time. So, gone. The beets were fantastic. I made a discovery a few years ago, which is: I LOVE BEETS. Not pickled beets, which is where I had gone wrong for 28 years. Fresh beets, roasted, topped with a balsamic vinegar-olive oil dressing are amazing! My favourite beets recipe comes from Eat, Shrink and Be Merry, but I can't find it online, and I'm sorry but I'm tired and don't feel like typing it out tonight. For a back up plan, try this recipe from Chatelaine; it was good! Even better, Olivia likes beets too, which makes it 2-1 for wanting beets in the house. Yay!

I had promised O we could make cookies today, but we ditched that plan and went to watch G play baseball instead. Tonight I had to make the cookies on my own, as the butter I had put out to soften was melting in the heat of my kitchen since I had my oven on for hours roasting ribs and beets. From September 2009's Chatelaine: The ultimate chocolate-chip cookie. I made it with one cup chocolate chips and one cup walnuts and now that I've eaten five and feel slightly ill I can tell you they are delish and will be going in the keeper book. Yay for keepers!

But the real highlight of my day was that O and I spent the whole day together, had some awesome bonding time, she was an amazingly polite and well-behaved 2 year old and I didn't lose my patience even once. Yay for both of us. Now, bed, zzzzz.....