Life is amazing and full lately! School has begun and I’m beginning to sift through all of the fantastic images of our time together growing food, cooking, creating, and traveling as a family over the summer break. One constant in our garden is this chinese red noodle bean that I have posted about before. It’s one that I should really start carefully seed saving from since you never know when the seed will become unavailable. We grow it in a pot on our terrace for easy access and the kids like to just eat it raw from the vine. This year I also added it to our larger garden and we have named it “nature’s twizzler”, our unprocessed version of a twizzler. It tastes nothing like a twizzler, but you would think that it was actually candy the way my kids tear off the bean and eat the entire pod, seeds and all. My favorite way to make it is with sriracha sauce or a sweet chili sauce that I posted last year here. Here are a couple of other recipes from our local New Roots for Refugees farmers (who I actually bought my first chinese red noodle bean from several years ago). I haven’t tried these recipes yet, but they look very tasty.
One other vegetable that we always have in the garden are beets and as a matter of fact I just popped more seeds in the ground today to get a fall crop of them. The kids all love beets and a favorite way to make them this summer has been this raw beet salad.
RAW BEET SALAD
2 large beets, peeled and shredded (you can wear rubber gloves when peeling if you are concerned with purple hands)
2 carrots, peeled and shredded
1 apple shredded or thinly sliced into match sticks (green apples work nicely, but any apple will do)
1 t. grated ginger
DRESSING
1-1/2 T. raw honey
1 t. balsamic vinegar
1/4 t. salt
1/2 juice of a lime
DIRECTIONS
Set aside the shredded beets, carrots, apple, and ginger. Mix together the dressing and pour over the beet mixture. This can be eaten right away but the taste gets better after the flavors marinate.
Enjoy!
Julie
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