Hi, I'm Gardener Scott.
My wife loves pickled beets and normally when I make pickled beets I use vinegar.
But today I'm doing it a little differently. So join me as
I ferment beets.
 
I grow beets in my garden and recently harvested these beauties.
Now, normally, I like to eat the smaller beets, but when I have some that are a little bit bigger
I think they beg for pickling and as I mentioned I normally pickle using vinegar.
But today I'm going to be pickling using a fermentation process.
Fermenting beets is incredibly easy.
You just take beets, put them in a jar or a crock and then cover with a brine. And the brine
is just salt and water.
Today I'll be adding one ingredient.
This is star anise, and it should add a very unique flavor to the beets.
I began by cleaning the beets very well. They were covered with soil after
I harvested them, but a quick scrub under water and they're ready to go.
You won't need to remove the skin of the beets for this recipe. You can,
but it's not necessary.
I'll take the clean beets,
cut off the root section,
cut off the stems, and this will go into my compost pile. Just set it off to the side, grab the next one,
cut off the root,
cut off the stems, Set this aside for the compost pile.
And I'll continue doing this
with about four to five of these larger beets
for each quart that I plan to make.
I'm going to cut these beets into half-inch chunks
I'll cut off one of the sides
and then just make
successive cuts
to approximate about half an inch.
And then I'll come back
and I'll cut the beets
into little squares
and then put them in a bowl.
Now remember, you don't need to remove the skin from the beets, but
Beets is not the prettiest vegetable.
And so if you want it to look a little nicer and to have the chunks a little more symmetrical,
feel free to trim as necessary.
If you like the symmetrical look just do away with a little bit of the curve.
Straighten off your cuts,
make a square or a rectangle,
and now you have beautiful symmetrical cubes.
I'm okay with some of the chunks being irregular, and leaving the skin on adds extra vitamins.
So, I'm okay if my beets aren't going to be the prettiest ones,
but they'll taste good.
I finished cutting my beets into half inch cubes and
I think I made extra, but that's okay because whatever is left over I'm planning on roasting for dinner tonight.
With the beets cut, now you can focus on the brine.
Recipe for the brine is very easy. You start with two cups
of filtered water.
Now, I'm actually filling to four cups because I'm doubling this recipe
and for every 2 cups of water you want to add
1 tablespoon of salt, so I'm adding 2 tablespoons to the 4 cups of water.
So the recipe again... cubed beets, brine,
and the star anise.
And for each quart of these fermented beets, I'll be using two whole stars.
I'll begin by dropping one of the stars into
an empty clean quart jar.
Then I'll just fill it up
with my beets.
Shake a little bit so that they compact a little bit more.
And I wanted to come up just about to the bottom of the ring on the jar and now
I'll just fill
with the brine up to about that same point.
And as the last step in filling a jar, I'll add the second piece of star anise.
Next you need to weigh down
the beets. I've discovered these really cool glass weights.
So I'll just set it into the jar and that helps ensure that all of the beet chunks are
submerged in the brine.
With the beats weighted down,
now it's time to cover. I like to use these
fermentation lids. They're not necessary, but it's something that I find makes the whole process much easier.
The fermentation process
causes the creation and release of carbon
dioxide gas. Now, by using one of these fermentation lids, the gas can escape
through the top of this and you really don't need to worry
much at all about it. If you don't use one of these lids that's perfectly fine.
You just need to put some type of cover over the top to allow that gas to escape.
Feel free to use cheesecloth,
muslin,
even a kitchen towel. The idea is to keep dirt and insects out
while the gas is escaping and the fermentation takes place.
And that glass weight I use to weight the beets down,
that's not absolutely necessary either, but you want something to hold the beets
underneath the surface of the brine. You could use a plastic bag
weighted to keep it underneath.
You can use cabbage leaves, you could use celery, you can use anything you want as long as the beets stay submerged
underneath the liquid.
So why do the beets need to remain submerged?
Well, fermentation is an anaerobic
process. That means the bacteria that conduct fermentation can't live in the presence of oxygen.
So any beets that float to the top will be exposed to the air
and fermentation will stop for those pieces. So we want everything to be weighted and ferment evenly.
This is a two-week fermentation.
So now they need to go into a cool dark
location. For me, that's my basement. And about every two, three days
I'll check on them just to make sure there's no mold and to make sure that everything looks okay,
to include the escaping gas bubbles so that I know the fermentation is taking place.
So I'll be back in two weeks and I'll let you know how it goes.
The beets have had a full two weeks of
fermentation and for good measure
I went ahead and put the jars in the refrigerator for a couple days just to help the flavors meld.
And how are they?
Well, the jar with the
star anise
produces a crunchy, slightly salty beet.
It's like eating a crunchy pickle but it has that earthiness of the beet and
that distinctive flavor of the star anise
and I actually like it quite a bit.
The other jar,
where I didn't use the star anise,
just the beet...
Is also very good,
but the focus in this jar is more on that briny flavor.
Still has a saltiness, still has the sourness that you're probably familiar with in the pickling process.
Also, this jar was primarily filled with those cubes
where I had cut off the skin, so it has a much
deeper red color.
This jar with the beets where I left the skins on most of the beets has more of a brownish color,
and that's probably because
the skin on the beets was
brown in color. So I had pointed out that it might be personal preference as far as whether you leave the skins on or not,
but it also goes to show that it changes the color whether you leave the skins on or not.
What's the verdict? I think they're both good.
However, my family after having tasted both, still prefer the flavor of the
basic beet in brine. I think the star anise covers up some of that briny sour flavor,
but it's definitely something to try.
We'll end up eating both of these. They're wonderful to add to salads. It's a great snack and when we put together
plates of pickles this will definitely be on it.
So there you have it.
How to ferment beets. If you have any comments or questions, please
let me know below.
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I'm Gardener Scott.
Enjoy fermenting.
You
