I have been meaning to try beets for a while now. I have been seeing them at the farmers market for a few weeks and I finally got around to picking some up. The only dish that I have really seen beets in is a beet salad so I thought I would try that. I saw some recipes that called for boiling the beets and some that called for oven roasting. I decided to go with oven roasting as it seems to add a flavour. I had heard that beets can stain your hands red for a while so I wore ziplock bags on my hands while peeling and cutting the roasted beets. They did indeed leave some stains on the counter that took some effort to remove. The oven roasted beets were pretty good. They were sweet and I really enjoyed their texture. Now I am off to look for some more tasty way to use beets.
Roasted Beet Salad with Blue Cheese and Cashews
ingredients
- 2 medium beets (washed and trimmed)
- 1 serving salad greens
- 1 ounce blue cheese
- 1 handful cashews
- 1 tablespoon oil
- 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
- 1 teaspoon honey
- salt and pepper to taste
directions
- Wrap the beets in aluminum foil.
- Bake the beets in a preheated 375F/190C oven until soft, about 1 to 1.5 hours.
- Let the beets cool.
- Peel the beets and cut into bit sized pieces.
- Assemble the salad.
Beets are indeed one of my favourites. Thing is I rarely prepare them because they are quite time consuming. When I was in Greece I had beet salad almost every day…at least every second day. Roasting them almost caramelizes the flavour. Delicious!!!
I love beets! I don’t cook with them nearly enough though. I’ve currently got some candycane striped beets in my garden that I’ve been meaning to turn into something.
When i was in Australia I found they ate beets, (or beetroot as they say) much more often, it’s even a staple on the McOz, the Australian standard burger at the McDonalds there.
Beets are a wonderful veg and did you know most of our sugar comes from beets?
Also, the beet greens are also delicious braised!
Yeah… Beets are rather common in Australia. My neighbour let me tried some but I didn’t seem to like it. Strangely, I like to drink beet juice 😀
Hmm – I just love beets (you can’t beat beets, I always say)… I have in past eaten so many pickled beets, my pee turned pink. 🙂 This recipe looks great.
I for one am greatly disappointed that this recipe doesn’t have gorgonzola anywhere in it.
Maybe next time the Closet Cooker can do a gorgonzola-beet muffin or something.
I have never been a beet fan, but maybe I need to try them again!! I always have a box of disposable plastic gloves in the kitchen for things like this. That’s very creative that you used ziploc bags!!
I have found that rubbing down the counter and cutting boards with half a lemon afterwards removes stains quickly without much effort.
We love beets!! Your roasted beets (3/16/10) then your roasted beet salad (10/24/07) were inspiring! But, being me, I used what I had and ended up with a super salad: romaine, beets, craisins, walnuts, left-over Cornish hen breast, simple vinaigrette, topped with crumbled Feta. Thanks for the jumping off idea.
Maybe a small suggestion: Beets are really good friends with balsamic and thyme, or even rosemary. So a very nice way of roasting the beets is to peel and boil them for 15 min, toss them with vinegar, a bit of olive oil, herbs and throw them in the oven.