Archive for September, 2010

FFFFresh beetroot!

Well I’ve had a pro­duc­tive day. What started out as me hav­ing a nos­tal­gic trip across the wide expanses of youtube, resulted in a marathon pho­to­shop and illus­tra­tor ses­sion to pro­duce this:

Fresh beets

SNNNAP!!

Original photo used for com­po­si­tion  cred­ited to Darren Baker

Beets are cul­ti­vated for fod­der (e.g. man­gel­wurzel), for sugar (the sugar beet), as a leaf veg­etable (chard or “Bull’s Blood”), or as a root veg­etable (“beet­root”, “table beet”, or “gar­den beet”). Major root veg­etable cul­ti­vars include:

 

  • Albina Vereduna”, a white variety
  • Burpee’s Golden”, a beet with orange-red skin and yel­low flesh.
  • Chioggia”, an open-pollinated vari­ety orig­i­nally grown in Italy. The con­cen­tric rings of its red and white roots are visu­ally strik­ing when sliced. As a her­itage vari­ety, Chioggia is largely unim­proved and has rel­a­tively high con­cen­tra­tions of geosmin.
  • Detroit Dark Red”, with rel­a­tively low con­cen­tra­tions of geosmin, and is there­fore a pop­u­lar com­mer­cial cul­ti­var in the United States.
  • India Beet” is not as sweet as Western beet. However India beet is more nutri­tious than Western beet.
  • Lutz Greenleaf”, a vari­ety with a red root and green leaves, and a rep­u­ta­tion for main­tain­ing its qual­ity well in storage.
  • Red Ace”, the prin­ci­pal vari­ety of beet found in the United States, typ­i­cal for its bright red root and red-veined green foliage.
  • Blood Turnip” was once a com­mon name for beet root cul­ti­vars for the gar­den. Examples include: Bastian’s Blood Turnip, Dewing’s Early Blood Turnip, Edmand Blood Turnip, and Will’s Improved Blood Turnip.

    Check out the video after the break if you have no idea what I’m on about.

    (more…)

    Panorama: Siena, Italy

    The qual­i­fy­ing round of the paleo that I was sup­posed to see got can­celled due to rain, which is a pity because I wanted to take some awe­some photos!

    I did man­age to stich a panorama of the town square however:

    Siena, Italy

    Panorama of Siena Town Square

    In other news:

    A sieve, or sifter, sep­a­rates wanted ele­ments from unwanted mate­r­ial using a fil­ter such as a mesh or net. However, in cook­ing, espe­cially with flour, a sifter is used to aer­ate the sub­stance, among other things. A strainer is a type of sieve typ­i­cally used to sep­a­rate a solid from aliq­uid. The word “sift” derives from sieve.

    Sieves, yeah!