Adventures in borscht

I’ve been getting lots of beets in my Ambrose Farm CSA share, and I got tired of pickling them. They’re pretty good roasted in the oven and tossed into salads, but thought I’d try something different.
Borscht came to mind so I dug up a simple looking recipe from Food Network to try.
Had 4 beets left so I tossed them, some potatoes and a carrot (also all from Ambrose Farm) in some olive oil, sprinkled with salt and threw them on the grill to roast over indirect heat at low. The thermometer on the grill says it’s around 350°F. I also covered them with a foil pan to keep the heat in and help them roast faster.

The beets, potatoes and carrot hot off the grill

Once the beets cooled down a little, a little rubbing took the skins right off.

Cut up the beets and assemble the rest of the ingredients.

Onions, garlic and carrot were sauteed. I think I should have picked a different colour carrot. Didn’t really matter in the end anyway.

Add the chicken stock, let it simmer a bit and then in went the beets. The recipe called for blending, but my blender is kind of small, so I thought the food processor could puree things.
I ended up with finely chopped beets. Fail.
Then I thought I’d try the stick blender. It worked out a little better, although it still wasn’t very pureed.


In the end I ended up using the blender anyway doing it in about 3 batches. Now I have borscht! Tasted pretty good too with a dollop of sour cream. A little on the onion-y side though.