The Soaked Bean

Seeking Nourishment, Finding Traditions

50-Minute Barszcz

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During these dark winter months, Geneva becomes land-of-the-dinner-party.  When the cold wind blows, when the sun straight up disappears, when night falls just before five o’clock, there’s no better way to see your friends than in your home, gathered around your table, tucking into something warm.  Just last week, we were hosts on Thursday, guests on Friday and guests on Saturday.  Phew.  And while I sincerely adore the new friends I’m meeting here, sometimes, and especially during these more reflective months, I can’t help but miss the old ones.

Like Kasia, who lives in Vancouver.  Kasia and I only met last year, but as we share a sign in the Chinese Zodiac (rabbit, in case you were wondering), were both born on the 28th (of different months, but that’s besides the point), and are both prone to a vata imbalance (the tell-tale sign being chapped lips [and too many parenthetical asides]), it’s safe to say that we’ve known each other a long, long time, karmically speaking. We met at school for holistic nutrition and it was love at first  alternately serious and silly conversation.  Much of the time we spent together was like one long dinner party for two (or three, or four, or six) where nourishing food and avant-garde dance moves were never-ending.

One grey winter day, we made a barszcz, which is a beet-soup for those of you who don’t speak Polish (everyone, except Polish people and Lu who learned it for fun).  I’d been making barszcz a lot that winter, as beets are one of my favorite vegetables and soup is my favorite food, but had yet to prepare it with Kasia, who hails from Poland and grew up on rye bread, liver pate and, of course, beets in all forms, including soup.

Kasia’s version of barszcz is her mother’s, only half-blended and served with a whooping spoonful of mashed potatoes.  As I prepare a barszcz for myself on this grey, winter day, I’m transported to that evening–beet-chopping, potato-mashing, faux-philosophizing, interpretative-dancing–and feel nourished not only by fibrous, nutrient-rich beet, but by friendship, old friendship, soul friendship which is a maybe one of the most precious nutrients of all.

The Bountiful Beet

Beets are chock-full of vitamins and minerals–folate for nervous system support , manganese for protein digestion and utilization, potassium for blood pressure regulation, copper for tissue healing and bone formation, magnesium for heart-health, vitamin C for immune system support, iron for hemoglobin production–and loads of fiber.  But, their nutritional value doesn’t stop there.  The beet does, in fact, go on as the pigments that give beets their robust colors–from raspberry-striped to plum-jam to golden-ochre–are actually antioxidant and anti-inflammatory compounds called betalains, which have also been shown to support our liver’s detoxification process.  A nourishing choice for the, sometimes overindulgent, holiday season, indeed!

Betalains are sensitive and can be destroyed by prolonged heat.  This is why I suggest making a 50-minute barszcz, where the beets are cooked for only 30-minutes or so in order to preserve these super-powers.

chiogga

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50-Minute Barszcz

Ingredients

  • knob ghee
  • 1 medium yellow onion, diced
  • 1 leek, diced
  • 4 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 carrots, diced
  • 1/4 of a small savoy cabbage, grated or sliced thinly
  • 4 small-medium beets, or 2 large ones, diced
  • a teaspoon of black peppercorns, whole
  • 1/2 teaspoon of coriander seeds, whole
  • 2 sprigs dill, fresh
  • 1 liter broth; chicken, beef, or vegetable
  • a few pinches of salt

Directions

  1. Heat ghee in soup pot on medium heat. Once hot, add onion, good pinch of salt and let cook until translucent. Stir in leek and garlic and let cook for a few more minutes. Add carrots and cabbage, another good pinch of salt, and stir the pot so everything is distributed evenly. Turn heat down to low and let cook five minutes, stirring every so often.
  2. While you're waiting, wrap the peppercorns, coriander and dill in a cheesecloth and fasten. This will be your spice-sack.
  3. Add beets to the pot, and let cook for a few minutes before adding your broth. Add your broth and your spice sack, bring pot to a boil, cover, turn heat down to low and let simmer for 30 minutes.

You can either fully blend your barszcz like I did, or you can blend half of it, or none at all.

Enjoy with a side of fermented veggies, raw-milk sour-cream or a soft-boiled egg or a spoonful of mashed potatoes and a hunk of sourdough bread.

Dimanche Roast: Pot-au-Feu

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I had my first Suisse pot-au-feu last February while tucked away in the snowy mountains.  This was the traditional version, with beef, bones and vegetables slowly simmered on the stove, carrots and leeks ladled from the broth then salted and slathered with grainy mustard, broth and tender meat sopped up with, not fork, but hunk of crusty bread.  It was just the kind of cheek-flushing, sweater-no-longer-necessary, deeply-warming meal that the (witch) doctor ordered.

Pot-au-feu, or literally pot-over-fire, can be said to be France’s national dish.  Recipes for pot-au-feu are as various as the country’s regions, the families living in those regions.  The main point of pot-au-feu, from my vantage, is to gather honey from a weed: a low-cost (read: tough) cut of meat, some bones, some vegetables, a few sprigs of something green all turned tender, transcendently so, with the aid of heat and time.  The perfect meal for the first truly cold early winter Sunday with an extra-special bonus for une femme comme moi.

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Isn’t it Iron-ic?

I’ve said before that L & I really only eat meat once or twice a week, but this all changes for me during, borrowing my Ethnobotany professor’s line, my moon-time.  (For the more literal friends and/or the men among us, I mean menstruation.  Yep, just said menstruation on the internet.  Girl power!)  Us moon-timing women require 18mg of iron per day, as we’re losing 30-40mg of iron each month during our cycle.  Iron is one of the most difficult minerals to absorb and, although iron absorption increases with increased need, it takes several months to completely replenish iron concentration in the blood so it’s important to keep levels consistent. (Haas, 188)

Iron is actually a micro-mineral, or an essential trace mineral, yet it receives way more attention than some of the big gun macro-minerals like sulfur.  This speaks to two things: the first being just how important iron’s role is in our health.  Iron helps to form hemoglobin.  Hemoglobin carries oxygen molecules throughout our body.  Red blood cells pick up oxygen from our lungs and distribute it to the rest of our tissues, all of which need oxygen to survive.  To put it concisely: If we lack iron, we lack hemoglobin and therefore our tissues lack oxygen.  More concisely: no iron, no energy.  Even more: no Fe = no Fun.  The second thing: although iron exists in many food sources it’s also damn difficult to absorb, and not just for us moon-timers.

Heme vs. Nonheme

Two forms of iron exist: heme and nonheme or, simply, animal and vegetable.  Heme is found only in animal foods–it’s highest in liver and beef–and is the most easily absorbed and utilized form of iron.  Nonheme is found in vegetable sources–like spinach and pumpkin seeds–and, as even my vegetarian-leaning nutrition book admits, is quite poorly absorbed and utilized by our bodies.  (Haas, 188)

To further complicate matters for the herbivores amongst us, the highest sources of nonheme iron–whole grains and dark leafies like spinach and chard–contain certain compounds–phytates and oxalates respectively–that actually bind to iron, inhibiting its uptake and making it even less easy to absorb.  Further still, soy, a common source of protein in many a vegetarian’s diet, has been shown to decrease iron absorption.

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Absorbing it All

You can see now that the main concern with iron is absorption.  The bad news is that there are other factors negatively affecting this besides the aforementioned ones.  These include caffeine and tannic acid in coffee and tea, phosphates in industrial meats and soft drinks, antacids and the less easily remedied low stomach acid and fast gastrointestinal motility.

The good news is there are a few ways to positively affect iron absorption as well.  Vitamin C (sauerkraut with pot-au-feu!), the use of iron cookware (cast-iron dutch-oven for pot-au-feu!), and the combination of heme and nonheme sources (a kale salad with a heap-load of seeds with your pot-au-feu!).

Before I get to the recipe, I’d like to quickly discuss supplementation.  Elements of inorganic iron–such as those used to supplement refined flour–are dubious. In that form, iron can’t be utilized by the body and its build-up in blood and tissues is toxic.  Elevated amounts have been linked to heart disease and cancer. (Fallon, 44)  If supplementing, it’s best to use a supplement derived from whole foods rather than one synthesized in a lab.

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Dimanche Roast: Pot-au-Feu

Ingredients

  • 1 pound beef shoulder or brisket
  • 2 pieces of oxtail or marrow bones
  • 2 medium-sized yellow onions
  • handful of carrots
  • handful of turnips
  • 1 leek
  • two handfuls of new potatoes
  • 5 cloves garlic
  • bouquet garni with sage, rosemary and thyme
  • salt and pepper
  • knob ghee

Directions

  1. Heat oven to 200F. Lightly rub your cut of beef with salt and pepper. Heat cast-iron dutch-oven on stove-top and add knob of ghee. Once dutch-oven is hot, sear beef on each side for 1 minute or so. Remove from heat immediately.
  2. Place oxtail or marrow bones in dutch-oven with beef. Cover and place into oven.
  3. While your meat is roasting, prepare your vegetables, roughly chopping them so they are more or less the same size. The turnips and potatoes we used were small, so we just chopped them in half. You can peel your vegetables, or not. Leave garlic whole. Prepare your bouquet garni by tying a few sprigs of thyme, rosemary and sage together with string.
  4. After your meat has roasted on its own for about an hour, add vegetables and bouquet garni to dutch-oven. Keep roasting for another hour-and-a-half, checking on meat to see if it's tender.

Serve with grainy mustard, pickled things and a hunk of crusty bread (to spread your roasted bone-marrow on).

 

References:
Haas, Elson M, 1992, 2006. Staying Health with Nutrition. Berkeley, Celestial Arts.
Fallon, Sally, 1999, 2001. Nourishing Traditions. Washington, DC. Newstrends Publishing Inc.