Beets are...

I don’t like beets.

I realize this could become a problem since that I am about three weeks from jetting off to Ukraine, where this fuchsia-colored super food is a prime ingredient in the popular soup known as borscht.

Imagine my excitement when the Peace Corps called with an invitation to serve in Ukraine as an English teacher. I remember hopping onto the computer to research the place I would call home for the next two years. Now, imagine my utter despair when I learned that beets are a beloved food in this faraway land.

Those who know me well – or at least have been around when I am trying to rationalize a semi-foolish choice – have heard my self-serving motto, “Try everything once.” I must confess that I hadn’t lived up to that mantra over the past five months. In fact, I have hidden and cowered in fear … of a beet.

The root of this repulsion – one that sends waves of nausea crashing over me when I pass a container full over them at a salad bar – stems from my childhood. It’s really not my fault. In fact, like any good daughter, I blame my mother.

My mom loves to tell people about the time that she served beets to her three children. I was no more than 9 or 10 when she set my dinner plate down in front of me, and I sat staring at the dark red beets and the oddly colored juice oozing out of it. I have no idea what else was on the plate – probably some sort of casserole – but it was too late to consider my dinner’s finer qualities. I was thoroughly disgusted.

Mom's strict clean-plate rule made for a long night at the dinner table until us kids decided to get creative. Once our plates appeared clean, we dashed from the room before she could discover what really happened to those mushy beets. As she tells the story, it wasn’t until later that she found them stuffed beneath a plate, rolled in a cloth napkin, shoved into an air vent and splattered on the floor.

Flash forward to August 2009. As the 30-day mark of my departure loomed, I knew I couldn’t avoid the beet issue anymore.

I knew I couldn’t do this alone, so I called my good friend, T, and enlisted her help. She and I have been working to hone our culinary skills over the past year, and we figured this would be a nice way to wrap up our rather successful venture.

I researched the Internet and found that there are hundreds of ways to prepare this traditional Eastern European soup. I chose a recipe, gathered the ingredients and steeled my stomach for what I was about to do.

After three hours of cooking and carefully sticking to the recipe, T – the girl who thinks sugar is too spicy – asks if we should add more salt and pepper to the borscht. No, I tell her that we should make the borscht as the recipe states and only alter if necessary.

Then it was time for a taste test. I leaned in hesitantly, winced and then went for it. Here’s how I would describe the first taste of our borscht: watery red beef broth with the slight hint of vegetables. Translation? Disgusting.

Since we’ve found adding salt has always fixed any questionable dishes, T and I race to grab the shaker first. Liberal salting ensued.

“Oh no, now it’s like licking a salt cube!”

That was my direct quote (and I can verify that because T made me write it down immediately). So after another 20 minutes of improvisation, we finally made the soup edible again.

In the end, the borscht we made was pretty good. Second-day borscht is even better. Like any good Midwestern girl, I sprinkled a little bit of cheese on top and it tasted THAT much better. I'll confess that beets aren’t as bad and scary as I remember. The good news is that Ukrainians have spent years, not hours, perfecting their borscht recipes. I'll sample a few and report back on how good borscht should taste.

In a way, these beets represent what I hope will be a slew of exciting and sometimes uncomfortable situations that I will experience in the coming months. If nothing else, I will have some fascinating stories to tell. And as many of you know, there’s nothing I love more than a good story!

One last thing, this is for you, T -- Beet it!