This Salad of Beets and Cherries Is a Study of Contrasts
Spending money on ripe cherries is a serious commitment. For me, the cherry pie promise doesn’t outweigh the need to shell out and / or freeze a few pounds of very expensive fruit before it turns into a soup, which seems to happen in no time, but apparently the pickled beetroot salad promise does work.
Such is the power of a great cookbook; in this case it is Anna Applebaum and Daniel Crittenden’s Polish Country House Kitchen , which I received as a Valentine’s Day gift and immediately became a favorite. This is possibly the best cookbook I’ve ever had: the recipes are great, but more importantly, cooking with it has developed my instincts for seasonal ingredients like nothing else. I suspect this is because Pennsylvania and Poland have very similar climates and growing seasons, so traditional Polish recipes are almost guaranteed to work with the freshest ingredients I have access to.
The first recipe I knew I had to make from this book was a summer one: beetroot and fresh cherry salad with garlic lemon vinaigrette. It was full of ingredients and flavors that I love – beets, lemons, fresh garlic, tart cherries – in a combination I never thought of before, this is my favorite recipe. I always didn’t want to buy cherries, but even in February I knew that when the time was right, I would be ready.
I’ve been dreaming about this salad all winter and spring, and this weekend I finally got my chance. Cherries appeared in my farmers market, along with everything else I needed: beautiful young beets, purple candy and super fresh hard garlic. (Something tells me that they are all appearing on Polish markets right now.) I bought everything, hurried home and made a dinner menu with the strangest salad I have ever made.
My hopes were incredibly high and this recipe surpassed every single one. By all the rules, each main ingredient should be superior to the others – beets are sweet, but very earthy; cherries can be too tart, especially when combined with lemons; Raw garlic is aggressive and aggressive, but it never happens. Somehow everything works. If you are a beet lover, you should try it yourself; I will do this every summer for the rest of my life.
Beetroot, cherry and garlic salad
(Barely adapted from Anne Applebaum and Daniel Crittenden from Kitchen in a Polish Country House )
This time, I’m not going to tell you that it’s okay to do it with what you have. Cherries are indispensable – sweet ones won’t provide enough contrast – and to be honest, I don’t even think you should be substituting extra virgin olive oil. If you don’t have a cherry pit, don’t panic; You can beat them flat side of a knife, as the olives, or to use a stick to food, to quickly remove the seeds.
Ingredients
- 450 g small or medium red beets
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest, finely grated
- ¼ cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
- ¾ teaspoon table salt, plus more to taste
- Freshly ground black pepper to taste
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 2 tablespoons minced onions (red, white, yellow, green, shallots – use what you have)
- 2 cloves of garlic, grated or finely chopped
- 2 teaspoons of neutral oil (I used vegetable oil)
- ½ pound pitted, stalkless fresh cherries
instructions
Wash the beets, trim the fuzzy roots, and cook them in the skins using your preferred method. I grilled mine in the Instant Pot for six minutes at high pressure (natural release), which was ideal, but the time depends on the size of your beets and the method you choose. Wrapped in foil (or crusty in salt ) and roasted at 400ºF, most small to medium beets will cook in about an hour; cooked whole on the stove, they will take ten to thirty minutes. Just make sure they are completely soft and then set them aside to cool to room temperature.
When the beets have cooled, collect the rest of the ingredients. Combine lemon zest, juice, salt, pepper, honey, onion, garlic and oil in a bowl and toss with a fork.
Peel the beets – the skins should slide off right away – and cut them into half-inch cubes, or less if your cherries are especially tiny. Add the beets to the lemon mixture in a bowl, stirring to coat. If you haven’t already, cut out the cherries and seeds and then toss them into a bowl. Stir everything together, taste and adjust the seasoning as needed.
Serve immediately or cover and refrigerate until needed. It lasts for about a week in the refrigerator, and the longer it is kept, the better it gets.
Like any other pickled beetroot salad, this salad requires mixing with something greasy and salty. I served it with fried chicken cutlet sandwiches and it was such a good combination that I dumped the beetroot and cherry salad right on top of the cutlets for my second serving. Grilled steaks, chicken, or sausages are obvious pairings in summer, but this salad would be appropriate at home next to or inside a particularly sumptuous grilled cheese sandwich.