Cooking magazines, along with everything else in our world, have been changing with the times.
Take the articles (and food styled pictures!) of the pre pandemic. These are often about elaborate dishes, exotic, involving multiple ingredients and many preparation steps. There are frequent warnings. Don’t use this kind of potato. Do use this kind of olive oil. Don’t use this prepared soup. Use this pan for this step, another pot for the next. Do use this kind of homemade broth. Etc.
But as it got harder and harder to congregate in a professional kitchen, as more and more food writers were working at home, and as food styling and photography needed to involve fewer risks, the recipes simplified, sometimes radically. Fewer dishes, pots and pans. More alternate uses of ingredients.
All the things I would hope we would consider even before the days of food porn were upon us. Don’t get me wrong, I love food porn as much as the next consumer. I love reading elaborate recipes. I just don’t like to cook them. Most of all, I dislike any attempt to make my own meals feel inferior to what I’m seeing on the page.
I meditated on this the other night, while reading a magazine recipe for bean soup. This used canned beans, which, it is true, are a timesaver if you already have them in your cupboard. But of course this is more expensive than if you make the beans from scratch freezing the leftovers.
(Take beans. Add water to cover and salt. Boil hard for one minute, turn off, leave for an hour. Rinse. Cover with water again and salt. Add any aromatics you want—bay leaf, garlic clove, pepper pod, etc.—bring to a boil. Turn to a simmer. Simmer till done, usually about 40 minutes to an hour depending on how old your beans. Store with the liquid. Freeze unneeded beans in containers. When ready to defrost, just dump frozen beans in a pan with a little liquid—water, tomato juice, broth, beer, wine—and defrost over a low flame before continuing with the recipe. There. Easy, isn’t it?)
Just about every pre pandemic recipe I had read that included canned beans warned against using the can’s liquid. This was supposed to taste off or something. I never noticed an off taste in liquid surrounding canned goods (what about tomatoes? They never say that about tomatoes), and always added it to whatever. So it was with a feeling of satisfaction that I read, this time, that you should add the can’s liquid ‘for extra flavor’.
Well, indeed.
Do add the liquids from cans for extra flavor. Also the brine of pickles, of capers, of pepperoncini (great in potato salad). Save every last drop of anything, and find out if you can use it to make your life better and your meals more delicious. Do not waste. Waste was the point of so many recipes up until the day that we realized we may not be able to waste for much longer. Continue creative. And don’t forget every so often to cook a big pot of beans from scratch.
As a lagniappe, here is a way to pickle beets. Every recipe holds out different ways of spicing and soaking, so this is a template to make a pickled beet recipe your own.
First take some beets.
If canned beets, use the liquid as part of the pickle.
If raw beets, wrap in foil, lay on a cookie sheet, put in an oven (toaster ovens take less energy, unless you have other things going in the main oven) at 400 degrees. It doesn’t matter how hot the oven is really, it just speeds up the process if hotter, and slows it down if moderate. Cook until you can smell the beets from across the room. This will take an hour or so, depending on how big the beets and how hot the oven. (And do not discard those beet greens. Blanch them, squeeze them dry into a ball, slide into a container or bag, and freeze to add to casseroles or pasta or soups later. The beet stems can be chopped and added to the dog’s food. Dogs love them.)
Let the cooked beets cool till you can handle them. Pare off the stem and root bit. The skin should slip off easily (though your fingers will remain pink for an hour after). If it doesn’t, you didn’t leave them to cook long enough. But don’t worry (never worry), you can peel with a paring knife; they’re still great even undercooked. And they’re still great even overcooked. (Love those beets.) Slice or dice the peeled beets and put them in a heatproof bowl or a jar. I like to add thin slices of onion or shallot, and a peeled garlic clove or two, but these are certainly not necessary.
In a saucepan, combine vinegar and sugar in a 2 to 1 ratio. Any vinegar, any sugar. I use white vinegar and white sugar. But go wild. (Now is the time to add the liquid from canned beets if you have some.) Add any flavorings you like. A little salt. A garlic clove is nice. A couple of peppercorns. A bay leaf. A sprinkle of cumin or caraway seeds. Any combination of the above. I personally love pickled beets that taste of star anise, so my preferred combo is salt, peppercorns, bay leaf, garlic clove, star anise pod.
Bring to a boil and simmer till the sugar is dissolved. Then strain it, pouring over the beets. If you’ve made too little, just put more vinegar and sugar in a 2 to 1 ratio in the saucepan and simmer till dissolved. Pour over the beets.
Let cool. They’re ready to eat immediately, but they’ll last a long time in the fridge. I’ve even left them a month and no harm was discerned.
These are great on their own, or in salads. I like them on top of shredded iceberg lettuce with sliced radishes and a blue cheese sour cream dressing (sour cream, dash of lemon juice, salt, pepper, crumbled blue cheese, crushed garlic clove). A traditional American diner salad which I hope has not fallen into desuetude.
Because you know what? Everything old is new again. Waste not, want not. As they’re starting to say in food magazines worldwide.