The Beet Goes on Salad is one of my absolute favorites! As a matter of fact, most any salad with beets ranks high on my list and as far as I’m concerned, this is the highest. If you’re here, maybe you’re a beet lover, too. Just know you’ll find several beet salads on my site as well as other beet-related recipes!
I’m afraid I can go off at a moment’s notice waxing on poetically about the humble beet with only the least bit of encouragement…or maybe no encouragement at all! I love love love them and have a whole article here on them: What to Know About Beets.
About The Beet Goes On Salad:
But back to this simple little salad. It is simple but each ingredient shines. It’s gorgeous with bibb or butter lettuce (and makes a great composed salad on individual plates if you’re looking for something elegant) but romaine or red lettuce is great, too.
Then there’s the hint of goat cheese, a few red onions, and my Honey Citrus Vinaigrette (I could almost drink that stuff) sets everything off to a T.
When I served this salad to my daughter and her hubby, Jessi said she had something similar recently at an Atlanta restaurant. The price? 17 bucks! This salad looks even more “Gourmet” with various colors of beet, but it tastes just as good when made with the common garden beet, and its fab with pickled beets, like my Grandma’s Pickled Beets, too,
By the way, don’t like goat cheese, can’t find it at your store or it costs too much? I always give you shopping strategies at the bottom of the post but feel free to sub in feta cheese, farmers, or even dry cottage cheese. My favorite is honey goat cheese.
Honey Citrus Vinaigrette
Making The Beet Goes On Salad:
This salad is so simple to make but be sure to make that Honey Citrus Vinaigrette. It just makes the salad. I generally make more of that vinaigrette and use it for other salads, too.
When roasting beets, did you know that if you leave the root and stem ends on until last when peeling, they hardly bleed at all! Yay for that! And of course, I always peel them after they are roasted – the skin slips off easily.
If red onions feel a little strong to you, soak the slices in water for about half an hour, rinse and then add to the salad. That little bath will tame them. I do think they are a must to counter the sweeter vinaigrette and the creamy goat cheese.
Grandma’s Refrigerator Pickled Beets
Saving Money on Ingredients:
Get the most bang for your buck. Be sure to rinse (very well) the tops of your beets (they’re usually not pretty) and use them in salads, smoothies like my Big, Fat Green Smoothies, or pesto. If you cook them they don’t amount to much. Like the beet, they are extremely good for you. Read what the World’s Healthiest Foods says about the humble beet.
The priciest time in this recipe is the goat cheese. When I buy what I think of as “near deli” cheese, I watch for coupons and sales. You’ll often find coupons on the producers site. They can really help a lot if you have a sale that says buy one get one free or buy one get one half off. You can usually put a dollar coupon on each log so it is worthwhile to check for coupons. Sometimes coupons are hanging in the area where the cheese is sold, too. Your buyer’s club or Aldi are also great places to get goat cheese.
As far as lettuce, generally bagged lettuce is 4 to 10 times the amount of lettuce by the head. Pay attention to those prices. Comparisons are often difficult (probably planned that way!) because head lettuce is sold by the pound while bagged are always by the ounce in odd amounts.
The Beet Goes On Salad
The Beet Goes on Salad
- Prep Time: 45 minutes
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: 4 servings 1x
- Category: salad
Ingredients
- 1 bunch of Roasted Beets, skinned, trimmed and sliced (or equivalent of pickled beets)
- 1 bunch of Bibb, Butter or Red Lettuce
- 1/4 to 1/2 Red Onion, halved and thinly sliced
- 1/2 log goat cheese, scraped & crumbled with a fork
- Honey Citrus Vinaigrette (see recipe)
Instructions
Roast beets in oven: Wash, remove greens, place on a sheet of foil and wrap well, closing at the top. Place on a pan and roast in a 350 degree oven for about an hour. Open package carefully, let cool. Slip off skin with a vegetable peeler or paring knife. Slice into 1/4 inch slices. Set aside.
In a large bowl, place washed and torn lettuce leaves and red onion. Toss with dressing. Place on platter or serving dishes, sprinkle with goat cheese, arrange beets on either side, strew red onion over the top.
Note: This is an acidic vinaigrette and will wilt a delicate green like these lelttuces. Dress it right before serving! It doesn’t hurt, if you think you’ll only eat part of the salad to dress just a portion of the greens. The goat cheese is also delicate. Don’t toss it in the salad, sprinkle it on top.
Keywords: Beets, Cheese, Goat Cheese, pickled beets, Red onion, Salad, Salad Dressings
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