Sometimes I feel like I have a double life, but in the best possible way. I was thinking this as I was chopping some large and slippery cooked beets for a salad called rosolje, a vibrant purple concoction that is a stable on every Estonian külmlaud, or “cold table” buffet. It is the most marvelous dish, similar to potato salad (or as my friend's mother said as I was explaining its ingredients: “borscht salad!”) The primary difference is that it's the most wonderful shade of mauve and has the added tang of finely chopped salt herring.

This is quite a momentous experience, as I am making rosolje for the first time. Until now, as a first generation Estonian-Canadian born in Toronto and now living in B.C., I have relied on the cooking of my grandmother and mother to enjoy this dish I've known since childhood. But I've decided that, since my grandmother is no longer with us, and my mother is now in her late 70s, that I should carry on our heritage by making the salad myself, before it's too late and these recipes are lost forever.

I have to say I am a bit nervous. I have risotto making down pat, and even know my way around a curry, but assembling this mysterious salad is downright daunting.

The occasion for this rosolje is a lunch I'm hosting for my Estonian-Canadian friends. This past summer my friend Anne-Reet and I decided to do this, and serve rosolje, so we can enjoy the foods we've grown up on with our other friends of like palates.

As my hands become stained with beet juice, I hear my grandmother's and mother's voices and I remember the warmth of their kitchens. I remember helping make rosolje, chopping the potatoes, apples, hard-boiled eggs and dill pickles into tiny dice, and mixing the dressing of sour cream, mayonnaise, mustard and vinegar. I decide to make my dressing with Dijon mustard and white wine vinegar, and realize this is how recipes change as they are passed from generation to generation. I mix the dressing into the chopped vegetables and this is when the transformation begins and the salad turns a lovely, creamy shade of mauve. It certainly looks like it's supposed to. I think I've done it!

My second generation English-Scottish husband Rob watches interestedly as I mix the salad. Over the years he has sat at many a dinner table with my Estonian relatives and has grown to like most of the foods on it. He laughs as I taste the salad and give a little gastronomic moan of delight. “You would just love to run barefoot through that salad, wouldn't you?” he quips as I sample the rosolje yet again to make sure the spices are right.

I know I've hit the mark when at dinner that night Rob goes back to the refrigerator for a second helping. He pronounces it one of the best he's had.

The next day, as I sit with my friends, my mother and sister who have traveled to Brentwood Bay from Saltspring Island to be with us, and eat the rosolje, I think that not only is this a celebration of all things Estonian, it's the best of being Canadian.

For my double life is truly an enriching one. I can celebrate my Estonian heritage through the langauge, customs and food that are a part of me. And I can do this because I was born in this country and am a Canadian. It's a double life I wouldn't trade for anything else on this earth.

And as for the issue of recipes being handed down before they're lost forever, my friend Anne-Reet might have found the answer. She also brought her version of rosolje to the table. Only she found her recipe by entering the word rosolje into a search on the Internet, and had several versions to choose from within seconds. Either way, I think we're covered.

KARIN IVAND

( The author is a communications consultant who lives in Brentwood Bay, B.C. -near Victoria on Vancouver Island. She loves anything made with beets.)

***Rosolje***

Salad ingredients

4 medium-sized cooked, peeled beets.
6 medium-sized cooked, peeled potatoes
4 finely chopped dill pickles
4 chopped hard-boiled eggs
1/2 chopped, peeled apple
1/2 finely chopped small red onion

Dressing

1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon anchovy paste, or to taste (the original Estonian recipe calls for about 1/2 finely chopped salt herring, but this can be difficult to find and the anchovy paste my mother's idea is a good alternative and produces a very nice bite to the dressing)
pinch of sugar
salt to taste (be careful, as the anchovy paste is salty)

Mix together salad ingredients in a large bowl. Mix dressing ingredients in a seperate bowl, toss gently with the salad ingredients until well combined and the salad turns a tantalizing shade of mauve. The final dish will look like a purple potato salad. Chill and serve.

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