DK Crawford © 2010 photos n text
Earlier this spring I discovered a mystery hiding in the belly of our garden. It looked like huge tufts of swiss chard until I got closer and started doing some much-needed weeding. There beneath the greens lay something the likes of which I'd never seen -- a huge beet shaped like a molar that must have been growing for the last two years. I grabbed chris, dragged him outside and showed him the discovery. We discussed whether to dig it up or not and decided to wait until the Ventura County Fair came along to enter our beloved stowaway in the largest beet competition.
It took forever to get from March when we first discovered it to August and her greens grew larger, sprouted seeds and she started pushing out of the soil in the meantime. At one point, her greens took up at least half of our largest garden and we cut them off one by one in compromise as I wanted to plant other things.
The day finally arrived and I called Chris and asked if he'd water our beet so it'd be easier to unearth from the deep heavy clay soil it lay in. He did and by the time I arrived, he was ready to birth her from her bed. When he did finally get her out, we cleaned and marveled at her. She wasn't the deep red beet I'd envisioned: the bull's blood or red ace I imagined but rather either a golden beet or perhaps my favorite, a chioggia peppermint striped variety and that created a conflict for me.
Chris went inside and I moved the cumbersome beet close to my dog to photograph it, then sat down and pondered. If it was one of the varieties I adored, did I really want to give it up to the fair where it would sit for two weeks being marveled at or did I want to throw a party and do a beet bash or make borscht for 40? I put the question out to folks on facebook and though many were voting for borscht, others and Chris were most inclined to enter it. Finally it dawned on me that I could always go buy more beets at the market if need-be and this wasn't my end-all-be(et)-all moment, so I let her go. Well I did as much as I am able, with the caveat that if we saw a bigger beet at the fair when we went to enter her, borscht it was!
We showed up at the fair and Chris carried our charge all the way across the grounds to the agriculture building. He sat and started filling out the requisite paperwork as I casually snuck around and tried to spy the competition.
I saw some larger beets in the middle of the room but couldn't really tell their size. Then he peaked as I sat with our beet, came back and said, "We can so take them!" And her fate was sealed. Perhaps he knew we'd win, perhaps he was just not wanting to carry our 22-pound root veg back to the car...this I cannot answer.
As we signed off on our charge and handed her over, the intake women ooohed and ahhhed over her. When we were leaving a lady handed some of the judges a bottle of homemade limocello along with her pride of lemons and I quickly realized we could, perhaps should have brought gifts! If my southern training has taught me anything it's to never leave home without a sussie! On the way out of the fairgrounds we discussed the beets name and decided upon Bertha LaBrawn BonBon Beet.
Finally, toward the end of the week we got the opportunity to visit Bertha and learn her fate and well, see here...
There sat a long red beet, proudly wearing a ribbon while Bertha's contorted roots wrapped around the shelf. She may not have won but she is special, strangely shaped and certainly unique. I did note when researching a bit further that last year's winner for giant beet also won this year and it appears she and her sister take most of the root vegetable divisions each year. Somehow that spiked the competitor in me. We'll see if I or we enter again.
