Beety Borscht

last night I went to a dinner party, where I had a bowl of gazpacho, a crusty piece of French bread with roasted garlic, a few bites each of roasted eggplant and red pepper with a dollop of goat cheese, 2 garlic shrimp, and a wedge of potato omlet - tortilla espanola.
And 2.5 glasses of wine.

I literally passed out on the couch at 11.20 pm and let the party go on around me...E took me home at 12.30, put me to bed, and went back out to meet up with his college buddies at a local bar. I slept like a log until 9 am this morning.

Weight this morning was 228.5.

I started cooking today, both to clean out the fridge and to have great food options available. I'm making a borscht, which is a beet soup we will be eating cold. It's light, refreshing and tasty. Not protein packed, but there are options that help there...here's the recipe:
2.5 lbs of beets. I prefer smaller ones, think they have nicer flavor.
one large onion
either: sour salt/citric acid OR lemon juice OR apple cider vinegar - to taste - depends on the flavor you like. I use about 2 teaspoons of citric acid, or 2 tablespoons of lemon juice
kosher salt, about 2 teaspoons
sugar, I use 3 heaping teaspoons. you could also use splenda, but I think this small amount is just fine
fresh ground pepper

garnishes: hard boiled egg, sliced or roughly chopped, chopped cucumber, sour cream or greek yogurt (make sure it isn't non-fat, that won't give great results. I would try to use at least 2% or even full fat for this), chopped dill and a boiled potato, peeled and chopped.

Peel beets and cover with water in a pot. Add in the onion, whole. Add the citric acid, if using. Bring to a boil, then simmer for about 45 minutes, until they are soft. Add the salt, sugar, pepper and lemon juice/vinegar if you are using those. Cook another 10 minutes. Remove the beets and taste the liquid. If it tastes thin, then raise the heat and let it cook down and the flavors concentrate (that is the step I am doing right now!)
Meanwhile, chop or shred the beets. If you have a food processor, that would be a great use of it! Return then to the soup liquid, discard the onion.

You can serve this hot or cold.

Hot, add a few cubes of boiled potato, a dollop of sour cream or full fat greek yogurt and chopped dill.

If you serve it cold, you can include chopped cucumbers as a garnish, as well as some sliced egg. And all the stuff above.

I am also soaking chick peas, so I can make a red chard and chick pea indian spiced mess...I might add spinach as well to bulk it out a bit.


I am also defrosting a bunch of veal to make osso bucco, which will turn into a simpler veal stew that I will serve with polenta, I think. And green beans.