When I first started writing about food, it was always my intention to highlight ingredients, how to shop, compare prices, choose them, store them as well as use them. And I did make a stab at that, years ago, under “Ingredients” in my menu. So the first post in this series is What To Know About Beets.

Cubbys Beet & Goat Cheese Salad

Over the years, I began giving hints in every post about the ingredients. This year, I’ve decided to move forward with my original vision and cover an ingredient from (hopefully) every post with the goal of eventually having my site be a better resource for you. Today, obs, I am choosing beets, inspired by my recent posting of Cubby’s Beet & Goat Cheese Salad.

What To Know About Beets:

I’m talking about the common beet, here, and the culinary use of beets. Usually known in North America as the beet, and also known as the table beet, garden beet, red or golden beet, in other parts of the world you may see it called beetroot.

The common beet is one of several of the cultivated varieties of Beta vulgaris grown for their edible taproots and their leaves, which are called beet greens. Beets, along with chard, spinach, and quinoa, to name a few, belong to the chenopod family.

While most of us are familiar with the garden beet, beets also come in different varieties and might be purple, pink, golden, white, or candy-striped inside. Golden beets are said to be slightly sweeter than red beets, without as much of the “earthy” flavor of the common garden beet. The white is the least sweet and the candy-striped are among the sweetest.

Grandma’s Refrigerator Pickled Beets

What To Know About Beets, Shopping:

Fresh beets are available throughout the year, their season runs from June through October when the youngest, most tender beets are easiest to find, and that’s when you’re likely to find great prices for beets at farmer’s markets and better pricing at the grocer’s than you will through the winter and spring. Beets are usually sold in a bunch of two, three, or four rather than priced by the pound. In the offseason, those bunches are almost always smaller and the price higher, though you may find older and tougher beets as well, and have to pay a premium for them.

Fresh Beets may have beautiful beet greens, scrappy ones or the greens may have been removed. The greens say it all when it comes to freshness, although ratty greens don’t necessarily reflect the quality of the beets. For the tastiest beets, look for medium-sized to smaller beets that are darkly colored, firm, and smooth. Avoid beets with bruises, spots, shriveling, soft areas, or other signs of spoilage.

Beets are also available canned, in vacuum packed form, or jarred, whole, sliced or diced, as well as frozen. Those can be a viable option at a much lower cost than most fresh beets.

As far as variations you’ll see on the grocery shelf:

• You’ll find beets pickled, too, which is a simple process easily done at home for pennies. You might be paying more for pickled, which can be found canned or in jars and might want to consider making your own to save a little.
• You’ll likely see canned or jarred Harvard Beets on the grocery shelf, which are beets that are quickly processed with sugar and a bit of vinegar. The flavor varies a lot from dull to tangy and they usually don’t have quite the same flavor as pickled beets. Some producers refer to them as sweet and sour.

Since beets are experiencing a hey-dey as a superfood, you’ll find beets dehydrated as chips and in a powdered form and you’ll find beet juice and supplements at natural-food stores.

What To Know About Beets, Storing:

To store fresh beets, cut the greens off the beet at about 2″, so they don’t draw moisture and nutrients from the root end, leaving the two inches or so to avoid excess bleeding. Do not wash the beets. Place beets in a plastic bag, pushing out as much air as possible, and store in the refrigerator. The cold will slow loss of nutrients. Beets keep three to four weeks stored like this. Treat your beets gently; they look sturdy, but are quite delicate and bruising will cause excessive bleeding.

The greens should be stored in a separate bag, and unwashed until ready to use. Again, remove as much air as possible. They’ll keep for three to four days. If there are any ties or rubber bands on the greens, remove them immediately.

If the beets or greens form condensation after refrigeration, remove them from the bag after they’re cold, turn the bag inside out, and return the beets or greens to the bag.

Other methods of storage:

• Freezing: Do not freeze beets when they’re raw; the texture will not be good, but after being cooked, beets freeze well.
• Pickling: Beets pickle easily and are easy to do. Pickle for refrigeration in small batches. Check out My Grandmother’s Refrigerator Pickled Beets or can pckled beets in larger batches to store at room temperature using the water bath canning method.
• Canning: Canning beets (not the pickles) will require a pressure canner. Check Canning Beets from the National Center for Home Preservation.
• Beets can be dried or dehydrated at home. Again, the National Center for Home Preservation comes through for us with instructions for beets (and other vegetables) on a printable PDF.

Roasting Intact Means Less Leakage

Careful Peeling Means No Stained Hands

What To Know About Beets, Cooking:

Gently rinse whole beets, being careful not to tear or bruise the skin, which will cause them to leak more of their liquid. Unless you are very careful, it’s very likely your hands and fingers will be stained while working with beets. Wear kitchen gloves, and if your hands are still stained rinse and dry immediately then rub with lemon juice.

If possible for the best flavor and least mess, leave the skin on the beet and the stem and root ends intact when cooking. Just an inch or two of the stem & roots is fine. Leaving the skin on and ends intact when cooking locks in the flavor and maintains the integrity of the cells which minimizes leakage. Beets peel very easily after they’re cooked.

For less bleeding, after cooking whole beets, remove the excess root end first, peel, and then remove the stem end. When trimming the beet, either before or after cooking, slicing away just a bit extra from the stem and root end minimizes some of the “earthy” taste of beets that is offensive to some people. I definately recommend doing this after cooking for less bleed-out and mess.

The common beet, like most root vegetables, responds well to several cooking methods. A favorite method is to roast, wrapped in foil. If foil cooking is offensive, lay the foil out and place a piece of parchment a bit smaller than the foil on top. Either with or without the parchment, wrap the beets carefully making sure the seem is on top before it goes in the oven.

By the way, even the blander canned beets can be improved by drizzling with vinegarette and roasting; see both methods in Cubby’s Beet & Goat Cheese Salad.

Beets can also be baked, boiled, or steamed. Though I haven’t done so myself, some like their beets raw, often grated.

The leaves and stems of the plants can be steamed, simmered, or sauteed and treated much like Swiss Chard and they can be stir-fried. They may be eaten as a vegetable cooked or added raw to salads or smoothies. You can make beautiful, tasty smoothies very serious smoothies, which don’t necessarily taste good, but have so much going for them nutritionally. You might like to see my Big, Fat, Green Smoothies on a Budget. A lot of my potential food waste goes into those smoothies.

The stems of beets can be pickled as well as the root of the beet; I have never attempted to pickle either nor tried either pickled; it would require quite a lot of either stems or roots to make my time (and maybe yours) worthwhile. I’d guess if you’re a gardener and putting up a lot of beets after harvest, it might be worth thinking about.

My Big Fat Green Smoothies

What To Know About Beets, Nutrition And Health Benefits:

According to Wikipedia, a 100-gram amount (about 3 1/2 ounces) of beets supply 43 calories, contain 88% water, 10% carbohydrates, about 2% protein, and have a minimum amount of fat. Beets are also a source of betaine, an antioxidant that is evident in its rich, red-colored roots. The beetroot is also a notable source of manganese, folate, and vitamin B2, as well as a source of potassium.

Beet greens are usually a valuable source of lutein/zeaxanthin. One cup of raw beet greens may contain over 275 micrograms of lutein! Beetroots are not nearly so concentrated in lutein, although some beetroots, like the roots of yellow beets, may be valuable sources of this valuable carotenoid.

If you’re interested in knowing more about beets, their nutrition, and health benefits, including their role in detoxification, and their antioxidant, and anti-inflammatory properties, check a reliable site, like the World’s Healthiest Foods. It’s where I get most of my nutritional information (and a lot of information for this post.)

Myths and misinformation about the beet, especially since its sudden rise in popularity, are everywhere, some of them a little crazy! For instance, I saw a site that claimed that sugar in beets doesn’t affect the blood sugar of diabetics. Wrong.

What To Know About Beets, Nutrition from My Fitness Pal

What To Know About Beets, The Downside:

A side effect of beets, affecting 5 to 15 percent of the population is “beeturia” a condition that turns the urine pink or red. While not commonly a cause of concern in itself, in some cases it may point to individuals with iron deficiency, iron excess, or specific problems with iron metabolism. A follow-up with your Doc may be indicated.

If you have kidney disease, your Doc may direct you to avoid beets because of their high potassium content; elevated potassium levels may cause specific issues, including heart attack. Also, while beet allergies are rare, they do occur in some people. Symptoms of a beet allergy may include stomach cramps, diarrhea, vomiting, and hives. Anaphylactic reactions have also been reported.

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I hope you’ve enjoyed “What To Know About Beets.” I know I’ve only scratched the surface, but additional resources are listed below! In the meantime, if you can’t beet ’em, join ’em! (I couldn’t help myself!)

If What To Know About Beets has you hungry for more, click on the tag, “beets” at the bottom of the page to see all recipes on my site that reference the beet.

What To Know About Beets

Sources:

• Beets, General Information: Wikipedia, Beetroot
• Types of Beets, Berkely Wellness
• Freezing Beets: National Center for Home Preservation
• Pickled Beets, Water Bath Method: National Center for Home Preservation
• Pressure Canning Beets: National Center for Home Food Preservation
• Drying Beets: National Center for Home Preservation
• Beets, General Information & Nutrition: World’s Healthiest Foods

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I’ll be sharing What To Know About Beets at Fiesta Friday #261 co-hosted this week by Antonia @ Zoale.com and Julianna @ Foodie on Board. Stop by and visit Fiesta Friday and see what wonderful recipes have been posted this week.