Sweet Red Pepper-Beet Soup

It’s December in Chicago. The huge Christmas tree is up in Daley Plaza, the Christkindlmarket is in full swing selling delicious brats and sauerkraut to lunching business folk, and the Magnificent Mile of Michigan Avenue is swarming with residents, tourists, and their big red Macy’s shopping bags.

It’s chilly. It’s festive. It’s time to make some soup.

The Recipe

Sweet Red Pepper-Beet Soup, from Martha Stewart Living, August 2009 (also found on her website)

Scare Factor

Much like the Brussels sprout, and with no thanks to Dwight Schrute, beets don’t have the best reputation. They seem to be another food that not many people get involved with these days. The check-out guy at the grocery store this morning rang them up as radishes—no joke.

Like many others, I’ve enjoyed the occasional beet or two at a salad bar, but beyond that, they were pretty foreign to me. In addition, they’re not very pretty. They don’t exactly tempt their way into your shopping basket with their good looks.

Yikes.

Another veggie I would “meet” today, was the shallot. I had never purchased a shallot before, and was pleasantly surprised to see that they are basically tiny onions, but with slightly different coloring, and (to me) a little more pungent. Not too scary, but still a first.

The final scary step in the recipe—blending. I do have a blender, but I don’t like to use it. I had a bad experience once trying to “puree” a mixture of nuts, dates, basil, and olive oil for a different recipe. It ended with me beating a plastic baggie filled with said contents with a can of soup.

Here’s How it Really Went

When I’m cooking, I sometimes find it hard to really go through the recipe beforehand and prepare the ingredients so that they are ready when called for. But, I did today, and in doing so, realized that this wasn’t exactly the soup I thought I was getting myself into. It is to be served chilled. Not hot.

Well, okay. I guess those are the recipe rules, but… what would happen if I tried it hot? Nothing.

So I went forth. I chopped the shallots, and sliced the peppers into ½ inch pieces.

Then I moved onto the beastly beets. The recipe calls for them to be trimmed and peeled before being cut into ½ inch pieces. Trimmed? And how to you peel a beet?

I did some sleuthing online, and found a useful discussion board where people weighed in on their favorite methods for peeling beets. Unfortunately, 99% of these involved roasting them first. Well, my recipe didn’t call for roasting, but luckily I found one post from a guy who said he simply peeled them with a vegetable peeler, and said it wasn’t any harder than peeling a carrot.

A slightly more flattering shot

Well, it is a little harder, but not much. I never found out officially what trimming a beet means, so I took it to mean cutting off the top part connected to the leaves, and the creepy little tail/root that extends from the bottom.

One warning: these things are somewhat juicy. They don’t look like it from the outside, but they exude a deep fuchsia liquid that stains easily. Fortunately, I learned about this from the message board I had been reading earlier, and used a white washcloth (which is no longer white) to hold the beets as I peeled them, thus sparing my hands. This was a little tricky, though, and at one point, the whole damn beet fell into the garbage as I was trying to peel it.

Cutting the beets was easier than I thought it was going to be. I would just advise using a big knife. Beets are pretty solid.

Once everything was prepped, I went ahead and added the shallots, peppers, and beets into the pot, followed by the chicken broth and water. One thing that is absolutely stunning about this recipe is the colors, for which I credit the beets.

Following the directions, I partially covered the pot with its lid, and let it simmer for one hour. There’s nothing like a quiet, warm apartment with a pot of soup on the stove, and the timer quietly ticking away.

Ahh, peace.

Another warning: beets don’t smell great when they are being simmered for an hour. They don’t smell bad, per se, but they don't really make your mouth water, either. I had to open a window for a little ventilation.

After an hour had passed, I removed the soup from the heat, let it cool for about 10 minutes, and added the lemon juice and salt and pepper. Now for the part I dreaded almost as much as touching those ugly beets. Blending.

I ladled half of the soup into the blender, and then (from a different soup recipe I’d read), removed the little plastic cap from the center of the lid of the blender, and covered the hole with a washcloth. This is to let some of the heat escape.

Then, I made a classic mistake. I almost didn’t want to include it in this post, because it’s so cliché. But honest to God, it happened. I put the blender on it’s roost, plugged it in, and was immediately sent into my target heart rate zone as the blender started pureeing sans lid. Really. Who puts a blender away in the “puree” setting? Me.

Luckily, the mess was very, very minimal. I quickly wiped the red liquid off the counter and cabinet, put the lid on and blended away.

Once all of the soup was blended (I was able to do this in two batches), I poured it into a big bowl to place in the fridge to let chill. But, I still wanted to try it when it was hot. So I poured myself a small bowl, added some feta cheese (the recipe calls for goat cheese, but feta’s a little cheaper, so that’s what I used), and dove in.

The Verdict

Well, I hate to say it, but… I didn’t particularly enjoy it. I thought it was maybe because I was breaking the rules and eating the soup hot, but even after I tried it cold several hours later, I still didn’t really enjoy it.

I suspect this was due to my expectations. I was in the mood for a rich, thick, steamy soup for this chilly winter day, but instead ended up with a thin, chilled puree of a beautiful deep red color. Which, really, would be great for summer. You’d think I would have gotten the hint, considering I took this from the August issue of MSL.

Overall, I’d say to give this a try sometime in July or August. During the hot summer months, I think I would find this soup to be very refreshing, somewhat sweet, and slightly tart from the lemon and cheese.

But, as it is December and not July or August, looks like I’m headed to the Christkindlmarket for dinner tonight…

Don't Fear the Persimmon

This post isn’t about trying a new recipe, but rather, trying a new food. Whole.

While sitting down to have lunch with a coworker last week, I was a little surprised to see him pull three anemic, somewhat rotten-looking, orange-ish tomatoes from his lunch bag.

I'm all for not wasting food, but these tomatoes looked like they needed to be thrown away, and quickly. I didn’t want to be rude and insult his lunch, so I kept quiet. He washed one of the tomatoes, then cut a slice out of it.

Turns out, it wasn’t a tomato at all! What he had were persimmons. Prior to last week, I had never even heard of this bizarre little fruit, and after doing a quick and informal poll, I don’t think I’m alone. After a quick trip to the farmer’s market last weekend, I was the proud owner of one!

And, I think I like them. I think. They take a little getting used to. They should be eaten once they are very, very soft, my coworker explained. You may simply bite into one, skin and all, or you may cut it into slices.

The texture is like that of a very soft pear, only not as grainy. The taste is very sweet, with no hint of tartness (at least not the one I tried). And to me, it almost has a very, very faint pumpkin-like aftertaste.

Alas, I only purchased one (as a tester), and ate it raw, so I wasn’t able to make any new recipes involving a persimmon. But the next time I see one of these little guys, I’ll be sure to snatch one up, so that I can make this delicious looking recipe: Caramelized Persimmons (marthastewart.com).

Caramelized Brussels Sprouts with Pistachios (Sans Pistachios)

Warning: the following post contains graphic images.

Of Brussels sprouts.

Brussels sprouts with caramelized onions seemed like the perfect choice for my first “I’m afraid to try this recipe” post. I spent some time this afternoon with these little green guys, and here’s how it went.

The Recipe

Caramelized Brussels Sprouts with Pistachios, from Allrecipes.com

(I left out the pistachios, because I didn’t have any on hand)

Scare Factor

Well, for one, they’re Brussels sprouts. You don’t get much more “vegetable” than Brussels sprouts, and for whatever reason it had never even crossed my mind to try to make them. They’re about as cool as a pair of suspenders. But I think these nerdy little veggies are coming back. According to my mom, they’re the new sun-dried tomato.

In any case, there were a few firsts with this recipe for me, which made it a little intimidating. One was that, having only eaten Brussels sprouts less than three times in my life, I have never cooked them, or attempted to cook them. Another dish that I’ve never made, but had enjoyed many, many times are caramelized onions. I knew how they were supposed to look once they were done, which provided some comfort.

And one thing I didn’t own that the recipe called for was a steamer. The sprouts are supposed to be steamed in one of those little metal steaming baskets that you drop down into a pot of boiling water. They also make pots that have another pot that fits right inside the first one, but with holes so that the food can be steamed… but I don’t have one of those either.

A few things I did have

Here’s How it Really Went…

Well, first, the recipe didn’t call for washing or removing the bad leaves from the sprouts. Luckily, while browsing other recipes involving Brussels sprouts, I came across this handy tip, and I would recommend that you heed this advice. It’s easy to pick off the “bad” leaves from each sprout (and kind of gratifying, in a strange way), and while chopping off the little, hard stem did make some of the good leaves disconnect from the sprout, it was worth it. My sprouts turned out nice and soft, with no crunchy stems.

Once the sprouts were all washed and de-stemmed, I had to figure out how to “steam” them, without using any sort of steaming device. Instead of steaming the sprouts, I filled a saucepan with just a little bit of water, maybe enough to barely cover the tops of the sprouts. I brought the water to a boil, threw in the sprouts, and put the lid back on and left it there for about 8 minutes.

Here they are- boiling/"steaming" away. I took the lid off just for a second to see the nice, bright green color.

My logic was that the steam that would be trapped under the lid, and would circulate around in the pan and would “steam” the sprouts. Well, I don’t know if they ended up “steamed” or boiled (probably boiled, since they were sitting in a pot of boiling water), but they still turned out well! So, when cooking Brussels sprouts, this method proves to be as effective as steaming. Just make sure to drain them. Another tip: test to make sure they’re fully cooked by sticking one with a fork. In my opinion, there should hardly be any resistance.

One thing to be aware of, however, is that, if you don’t have an airtight lid, plumes of green tinted Brussels sprouts-scented steam will be constantly issuing from your pan, even with the lid on. I like Brussels sprouts, but this is not a pleasant smell, especially in a small kitchen, with poor ventilation. Be sure to warn your roommate first. Give her some time to escape.

Next, was on to caramelizing the onion. I began melting the butter in a pan, and chopped the onion into long strips. I used a white onion instead of a red, because this was what was in my pantry. But, I have made this recipe two times now, the second time using a red onion, and I really do think this is better. It certainly looks better (more like the classic caramelized onion), and I think it might taste better too.

Once the onion was becoming limp, and the smell of browning butter had replaced the odor of the sprouts, I gently added the sprouts to the onions (I found that cooked Brussels sprouts can be a little fragile), and added the sugar. This was where the dish all came together. I lightly stirred all of the ingredients around in the pan for a few more minutes, to coat the sprouts a little more, and that was it!

The Verdict

Was this recipe tasty? Yes, very. Even my roommate who had never tried a Brussels sprout before said, hesitantly, that she thought she liked it. I figure, it’s a way to make something that is very good for you, taste good. And that’s a good thing.

Was it as scary as I had thought? Nope! Not having any kind of steaming device didn’t hinder my cooking as much as I thought it might, and caramelizing an onion really isn’t that hard! Although I do recommend using a red onion (from my experience of caramelizing onions two whole times).

To all the novice cooks out there, I say: go for it.

What is this blog all about?

My name is Erin, and I don’t really know how to cook. Yet. But I do know that I am a lover of all things food and cooking related, and am just now, at the age of 24, making my first attempt at learning how to seriously cook.

Like many others out there, I love good food--and I have limited resources. A modest income that makes purchasing spendy ingredients or appliances somewhat painful, a very small kitchen in a small Chicago apartment, and, currently, a pretty small skill set when it come to cooking. But that's going to change.

Here's the plan.

Every week, I’m going to scour the Internet and the few cookbooks I own for recipes that, due to expensive/weird ingredients, techniques I’ve never heard of, or appliances I don’t yet own, I (and I think other novice cooks) would be scared to try.

And then, for better or worse, I'm going to cook.

I'll report back on what worked, what went wrong, and whether it was worth buying the $17 cheese. If you are novice (and somewhat nervous) cook like me, I hope you can learn with me, and share some tips you’ve learned as well. And if you’re a pro, well, then I invite you to laugh at me as I learn how to poach an egg.