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A Brilliant Fish Side Dish – The Mother of All Beets

created on: 03.12.2020 | by: Jürgen Oeder | Category(s): Recipes

By Martin Roeber

Praise whoever had the luck to eat fresh Mediterranean fish on the Dalmatian coast of Tito’s former Yugoslavia. The reason for this is that in those says the fish would certainly have been accompanied by the ultimate side dish. When, some 40 years ago at the beginning of my culinary career, I was first served a barbecued Zubatac (a dentex) in a small and cosy fish restaurant on the jetty at Cavtat (south of Dubrovnik), l liked the vegetables served with it: green leaves similar in appearance to spinach but with a slightly tarter taste and firmer texture.

I had never seen anything like it in Germany. The waiter explained that it was “Blitva”. Great, I was none the wiser. My dictionary was unable to help me, either. Today, I know that Blitva is chard a.k.a. in English as silver beet or mangold. At the time this was purely academic because you couldn’t buy it in German vegetable shops.

Many years later I discovered Blitva at a Turkish market stall in the Ehrenfeld quarter of Cologne. Many an experienced gardener, farmer’s wife or cook may well shake their heads: chard had, of course, survived in isolated spots around Germany as an arable plant. However, most housewives and gardeners had lost sight of this vegetable over the years. Nowadays you can buy it at any market or Turkish corner shop. And we thus have a ready supply of the most delicious supplement to fish dishes.

This is how you prepare – “Dalmatinska Blitva”:

First cut the wide, whitish stalks into roughly five-centimetre-long strips. Boil in water until they are al dente. Cook the green leaves as you would with spinach, i.e., let them crumple up in a little boiling water.

Then mix the stalks and leaves, sprinkle salt and diced garlic on them. And then comes the really important bit: drizzle some finest quality olive oil over the warm chard.

If you have a garden patch of your own, have a look at your beetroot leaves. You will find they look exactly like chards! This will lead to your referring to botanical literature: “Beta vulgaris” is a cousin of the white beet. Chard = beet leaves. Turnip greens, so popular or despised in the Rhenish cuisine depending on your culinary point, are also members of this family.

Leaf through a Latin dictionary: “Beta, ae, f. – a garden plant, beet, chard.”
So even the old Romans knew…Blitva, Beta, Chard – that is the mother of all beets and the best possible vegetable to accompany fish. 

Yet I can hear grumblers and thrifty fish cooks moaning about what to do with the leftovers from this delicious fish supplement…

This question leads us to a luscious starter, especially when served cold in hot summers, the ideal way to use up your chard leftovers. Take the cooked chard, mix it with anchovy fillets, garlic and finely diced onions and then marinate in vinegar with a dash of olive oil. Serve ice-cold with baguette bread as a starter.

Life of a culinarian: grilled, fried or baked sea fish with Dalmatian style chard, white bread and wine…