Joe's Eats

I wasn’t a fan of beets up until about 3 weeks ago. I think my issue I had was that I had only ever had them canned, and I just didn’t like the flavor of them. They came in that weird syrupy whatever sauce that is, and I’m not sure if they were pickled or what, but I tried them a couple of times hoping to like them but it just wasn’t happening for me. I was ridiculed by my Pops and my wife. Always made fun of during salad time when I wouldn’t add beets to it. Whatever.

Fast forward to a couple weeks ago – if you read the Anniversary blog you would have seen it – and I had a beet salad at dinner and LOVED it -

I’m talking L-O-V-E-D it. Admittedly, I had a couple of adult beverages in me at the time, but the salad was fantastic, and really simple. It consisted of greens, fresh beets, goat cheese, and a little vinaigrette. As always, less is more. Those beets were unlike any beets I had ever had before. So freaking good! I came to the conclusion that (SHOCKING!) fresh veggies are always better than canned. Duh. How dumb of me for waiting this long to actually try fresh beets. Since that night, I have been craving a beet salad. Last night, it was time. I stopped at the store on the way home from work last night, and grabbed a bunch of beets (this bunch was 3 good sized beets with their greens still on them). Since I had never cooked beets before I was unsure of the prep and how to go about attacking these. I texted my go-to chef buddy (thanks again!) and he let me know just how easy these were. I boiled them in water with a little bit of sugar, salt, and some vinegar. He also mentioned mustard seeds, but I didn’t have any in the pantry. I boiled these with the skins on for about 40 mins until they were tender enough to pierce with a paring knife. Since these were going into a salad, I needed them to cool off quickly, so after taking them out of the boiling water, I dropped them in an ice bath to stop the cooking and to cool them off. The skins peeled off with zero effort, I cut them into nice big pieces and served them over a spinach salad with goat cheese, olive oil and balsamic vinegar:

Again, simple = awesome. I do wish I would have had some walnuts lying around because I would have added those as well for some crunch (like in the salad we had), but I didn’t miss them too terribly. What an awesome – and super good for you – salad.

Low cal, too:

• 2 cups Baby Spinach – 20 cals
• 1oz Goat Cheese – 79 cals
• Beets (per cup) – 58 cals
• Olive Oil (1/2 TBSP) – 60 cals
• Balsamic (TBSP) – 26 cals

Next time, I’m roasting beets. Can’t wait!