I suppose all good things must come to an end. Today, that good thing was the beets from the garden. Victor wasn’t a huge fan of them until he found out that they all didn’t taste like those red things coming out of a can. Once he tasted a fresh golden beet roasted in the oven, he was a believer! We had a few last year – and even more this time around!

We planted golden beets and zebra striped beets and I even learned something about growing beets, as well. We had our beet section cordoned off and I went in to sow the seeds. Well… let us just say that I got lazy and didn’t plant them in any sort of row or order. I just kinda threw the seeds out and called it a day. Beets prefer to have a bit of room on their own to grow. They don’t necessarily like having six beets competing for the same real estate. Next year, I shall give them their proper space. Learning experience.

Tonight I took those beets and oiled them up a bit and put them – covered – into a 425°F oven for a bit under an hour. When they were cool enough to handle, I peeled them and cut them into chunks.

The chunks got liberally doused with balsamic vinegar and they went back into the oven to caramelize a bit.

And then dinner was served. Because we still have tomatoes coming out of our e pluribus unum, I sauted chicken breasts, topped them with a really thick slice of tomato, and baked them off for about 20 minutes. I then topped it all with cheese and let it all get gooey.

To complete the plate, we had a bit of last night’s eggplant rolatini.

I can’t believe how much fun this garden has been. We are really eating well. Really well. The fun has been trying to come up with different recipes using the same few items. We have canned pasta sauce, canned plain tomato sauce, salsa, peppers, eggplant… I have about 5 pounds of green beans blanched and in the freezer… And more tomatoes coming in.

I think this weekend I’m going to make some BBQ sauce.

And tomato salad. Lots and lots of tomato salad.