This week, Roy saw a huge bag of beetroot at the markets. It was a very good price, and Roy couldn't resist buying it. The problem was, he had no idea what to do with them and there was an awful lot of beetroot! There was no way we would eat them all immediately, so we needed some way of preserving them. I suggested we try making our own homemade pickled beetroot and, after a quick call to Great Grandma for her recipe, Roy thought this would be easy. Another friend sent us a recipe for a simple beetroot salad, which Roy thought might be a good base for a dip as well. We had enough beetroot that we were able to try all three, so this week Roy will show you how to make the pickles, and next week, he'll make the salad and dip.
You Will Need:
This recipe is enough for 2 very large beetroot (we had three, but only used two for the pickled beetroot) and fills a very large jar. If you want to make more, or less, just adjust the proportions.
- Beetroot. Roy used two huge beetroot.
- 1/2 a cup of white sugar
- 1/2 a cup of vinegar - Roy used brown, because he likes the flavour in pickles, but you can use whatever you like.
- 1/2 a cup of water
- 1/2 a teaspoon of salt
- A large jar (or a couple of smaller ones)
- Disposable gloves.
Method:
- First, you need to cook and peel your beetroot. To do this, wash them and if your beetroot have stems, cut off the leaves but leave a little stalk. You can eat the leaves, lightly steamed, in place of spinach. Put the beetroot (whole) into a big pot of water and bring to the boil. Let them simmer until a skewer poked into them goes in easily. You want them soft, but not mushy. How long the cooking will take depends on the size of your beetroot - ours were huge and took nearly an hour.
- When the beetroot are cooked, and while they are still warm, rub the skin off. Roy recommends using rubber gloves to do this, as otherwise your hands will turn red! The skin should come off easily.
- Cool the beetroot in the fridge.
- When the beetroot is cold, cut them up (if you're in a hurry, just wait until they are cool enough to handle easily). Again, Roy recommends rubber gloves. Roy likes slices of beetroot on burgers and in salads, so he made slices, but you can cut the beetroot into chunks or wedges if you prefer.
- Put the beetroot into the jar. You don't want to press it down too hard, as you want the pickling solution to fill any gaps.
- Put the vinegar, sugar, salt and water into a small saucepan and bring to the boil. You want to let it boil for about a minute, not just reach the boil and take it off.
- Pour the hot pickling solution over the beetroot and gently shake the jar to get it to fill the gaps.
- Keep the beetroot in the refridgerator and in about a week, you will have your own delicious homemade pickles!