You Can’t Beet A Root

On Saturday afternoon, I harvested the majority of our winter beetroot crop.  I planted two varieties this year of beta vulgaris,  Detroit Globe and Chioggia.  


Now Detroit globe looks like your standard dark purple beetroot, however the Chioggia is unusual and has red and white rings throughout the beet.  This is what it looks like;

Beetroot Chioggia – Diggers Club

Look kind of small, don’t they?  Well maybe not ordinarily, but when you compare these to one that I grew, the size of mine looks quite unusual.  Have a look at this!  I surprise myself sometimes.

Anyway, all jokes aside, it was into the kitchen with my beetroot booty and time to cook them up, peel (with rubber gloves on), make up a pickling vinegar and bottle the whole lot ready for summer barbecues.  We just love our pickled beetroot.  I used this recipe which I really enjoy the taste of;

Pickled Beetroot

2kg beetroot
3/4 cup water
1 and a half cups white vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
2 whole cloves
1/2 teaspoon peppercorns
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon mustard seeds
1/2 cinnamon stick
1/4 teaspoon salt


1.  Wash beetroot thoroughly and cook in a pot of water until tender
2.  Cool and remove skins (use rubber gloves)
3.  Cut beetroot into slices
4.  Place all other ingredients into a saucepan and bring to the boil
5.  Simmer for 5 minutes and then strain
6.  Pack beetroot into hot sterilised jars and top up with vinegar mixture
7.  Seal and store in a cool place


Use within 6 months.

I managed to make up 7 large jars, 3 red, 4 white/pink, however I doubled the recipe and probably had about 4kg of beets at the beginning.  Click to enlarge.

I am hoping that the Chioggia tastes the same as normal beetroot when pickled, or otherwise the chooks are going to have a feast.  It did taste a little bit less earthy than the normal beetroot, so I suppose that is a good thing.  


I left some more of these two varieties in the bed for salad greens, as the leaves are edible, and taste very nice in a normal garden salad.  All in all, I will probably plant some more beetroot next Autumn.  A good crop all round.


One thing is for certain, and that is that you can’t beat a beetroot!