One of my favorite root vegetables are beets. Not only are they beautiful (their colors range from a dark purplish red to dark purplish pink, from intense to bright gold, to candy cane stripes) they also have a wonderful texture and an earthy, nutty flavor. They’re nutritious and filling. They can be juiced, boiled, pickled, cooked in soups, mashed, sliced in salads, or roasted. Although they have the highest sugar content of all vegetables, they are very low in calories.
In season through autumn beets can be eaten raw or cooked. However, their buttery texture and sweetness shine through when roasted with olive oil, salt, and pepper in a 400 degree oven for 45 minutes.
To eat a beet you have to get rid of the paper-thin skin first. You can peel it off while it’s raw (getting your fingers stained scarlet in the process; beets stain everything). Or roast the beets gently until they’re tender, then rub the skins off with a paper towel.
Here are some of our favorite ways to eat beets.
Raw! ~ Yes, beets are quite good raw. Slice them up and serve them with a sprinkle of chile and lime. Delicious.
Beet chips ~ sliced thinly and deep fried with sea salt. Awesome.
Roasted with Feta cheese. ~ Our all-time favorite preparation. Golden beets are the way to go, much milder and sweeter than red. Roast beets until they are tender and juicy, then eat them with some spicy greens, purple onion and feta cheese. Add some toasted walnuts…Heavenly.
Beet greens ~Sautéed with olive oil and garlic, one of Kenny’s favorite.
In a salad. ~ Beets make a good complement to other salad staples.
Pickled! ~ Kenny’s pickled beets are just marvelous. The tangy vinegar and sweetness complements beets’ earth undernotes. Cottage cheese with pickled beets are my all-time favorite start to any meal.
As dessert. ~ Beets and their smoky, earthy sweetness are the secret ingredient in some fabulous desserts, like velvety beet and cocoa cake. Patti Cakes & Pies Catering makes the best… http://patticakesandpiescafe.weebly.com/index.html
