Twiggybet1's Blog

Cooking with Twiggybet
Aug 6, 2008 | 5:22 AM PST

Okay, so I know I'm not a Rachel Ray or Martha Stewart, but I thought it might be fun to share some of the things I do with my garden produce. 

I was so excited to finally get enough rhubarb this year to make a pie USING MY OWN!!!  Rhubarb pie has always been one of my favorites.  I made this one a couple of weeks ago:

The plum tomatoes have been coming in like crazy.  One of my favorite things to do with Romas or Plums is to stuff them.  I slice them lengthwise and scoop out the seeds, and fill the cavities with a mixture of buttered seasoned breadcrumbs and parmesian, top with provolone or mozzarella, and broil for about 3 minutes - just enough to warm them and melt the cheese.  This is what they look like before they go in the oven:

Sorry I don't have a picture of the finished product, but the family was too hungry to wait for a photo.  Heathens!

Another way I like to prepare plum tomatoes is to quarter them, mix them with some fresh picked, coarse-chopped basil, and drizzle with Italian dressing.  I will sometimes add some chopped sweet onions, if I have them.

 

I have regular sweet basil and a purple variety growing.  Looks pretty, but I didn't taste a difference between the two. 

Just for fun and to keep things interesting, we like to plant something odd or unusual in the garden every year.  This year we planted white beets along with the usual red beets: 

 

Yesterday, I cooked some up for dinner:

 

I treated them as I would the usual red ones.  I boiled them with some of the stem left on, then removed the skins and sliced them.  Guess what?  No colored water, no stained fingers!  To me, they resemble boiled onions:

I had been so curious as to whether they tasted the same as regular beets.  Well, they definitely  have a good beet flavor, but they seemed much sweeter.  Now if I only had a way to determine if the nutritional values are the same.  At any rate, I'm sure we will grow these again.  No stained fingers! 

Until next time, Happy Gardening!

 P.S. I found this nutritional chart for beets.  I can't find a comparison so I'll just assume that the different colors are similar:

Nutrition Chart

Beets/1 cup diced cooked

Calories 75 Total Fat (g) 0.3 Saturated fat (g) 0.1 Monounsaturated fat (g) 0.1 Polyunsaturated fat (g) 0.1 Dietary fiber (g) 3.4 Protein (g) 3 Carbohydrate (g) 17 Cholesterol (mg) 0 Sodium (mg) 131 Folate (mcg) 136 Manganese (mg) 0.6 Potassium (mg) 519