Permaculture, Homesteading, and Community Building // A Farm to Fork Beet, Fennel, and Black Bean Salad Recipe

Hello all! Happy Thursday on this beautiful spring day (at least in California :-) )

I've been writing a bit about how I've started my farm, and today I want to share an original recipe with you that I created today. Part of having a farm and growing my own food involves having a lot of fresh veggies to cook with. My favorite dishes to make are when I go out to my veggie beds, pick whatever is ready, head back into the kitchen, and figure out what to do with the ingredients on hand. It becomes an art form, creating different combinations and melding flavors! Personally, the act of regenerative farming is a way for me to heal the soil, and the act of cooking is a way for me to heal my body.

I am also passionate about creating farm to fork recipes to share with the wider community. I did not know how to cook for myself until a few years ago, and an astonishing amount of my friends still do not know how to. This is a problem, because no matter how well I grow organic beets and fennel, if my community members do not know how to cook with them, all of my efforts to provide healthy and sustainable food goes to waste. The farm to fork movement is a critical part of regenerating and healing our earth as well as our bodies and communities.

The ingredients that I used in this recipe were all sourced from my farm or my housemate's rooftop farm, with the exceptions of the beans, avocado, and salt. This is an in-season salad, with veggies that can be grown through the winter, so we do not have to depend on importing veggies from the southern hemisphere. Here is the recipe!

Ingredients

• 8 large beets
• 3 fennel bulbs
• 3 cups of cilantro
• 3 cans of 16 oz black beans
• 5 lemons
• 1 avocado
• 4 cloves of garlic
• Salt to taste

Directions

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, add the beets and reduce the heat to a simmer, cook the beets until the centers are soft when pierced with knife, around 30 minutes
2. Peel off the skins of the beets with your hands (you can do this under running cold water if the beets are still too hot to handle)
3. Chop up the beets into 1/2 inch cubes, add to a large bowl
4. Chop up the fennel bulbs into 1/2 inch cubes, add to the bowl
5. Peel the cilantro from the stems and chop up into smaller pieces, add to the bowl
6. Grate the lemons and add the zest to the bowl
7. For the sauce:
   a) mash up the avocado in a mason jar
   b) add the juice of the 5 lemons
   c) add salt to taste
   d) chop up and add the garlic cloves
   e) put the lid on the mason jar and shake all the ingredients together
   f) add the sauce to the large bowl
8. Mix all ingredients together, and enjoy! The dish can be enhanced with chips on the side, making this beet salad more like a beet salsa!