I have tasted new foods, spices and dishes in every country I have lived.
In Japan, I sampled Hokkaido pumpkin and nashi pears. In Malaysia, I tried okra, papaya, lychee, rambutan, mangostein, jackfruit, and durian. In tropical Australia, I slurped my first stingy mango.
I associate foods and dishes with places I have lived and loved.
During my childhood, at our summer house in Maine, my mother grew many of the vegetables we ate. Rather than spinach, she planted Swiss chard and beet greens. When confronted with large steamed beets in my twenties, I realised I had never eaten beets. I wondered how this could be. I remembered I never saw a beet because my mother harvested the greens when the leaves were tender and the beets too small to even notice!
When I began to shop in Australian markets, I could not believe my eyes when I watched farmers chop off the beet greens and throw them away! No one wanted them! I asked if I could take them and every farmer I have ever approached happily gives them to me for free!
Tonight’s dinner was fried beet greens with onion and Malaysian sambal. Beet greens are sweet, tender and delicious! Try them. You may discover you love them!!!