Recipe at a glance
Cooked beets, pear, feta, and greens make a sweet and tangy salad. Pickled red onion and lemon-mustard dressing finish the bowl.
This healthy and colorful salad can be a perfect addition to meat dishes, and also serve as a nice meal on its own if you prefer to pursue a vegetarian lifestyle.
Beet is well-known for its indispensable health benefits. Betacyanin, a colorful pigment in beet, is an antioxidant that can significantly help your liver get rid of toxins, and thus improve its main function to keep your body clean by absorbing all the harmful chemicals from your blood. Beet also contains betaine, a substance can be used to help with some forms of depression due to its ability to relax your mind and improve general sense of well being.
For healthy reasons we prefer using homemade sauces and condiments to those bought in a supermarket. There is value in making something from scratch, and you can always control what comes in a recipe and what quality product comes out of it. We used homemade pickled red onions for this beet salad. We recommend marinating some onions at the same time as you start cooking beet, or even some time in advance, it can be perfectly stored in the fridge and used for other dishes.
We know that a lot of people out there like beet but don’t like to bother with cooking it because the process seems time and energy consuming. If you are one of those people, we invite you to check out our *How to cook beet* (or Easy ways to cook beet).
We hope you like this beet salad as much as we do, and will learn to love beet not only for its health benefits but also for its taste and color!
Beet is well-known for its indispensable health benefits. Betacyanin, a colorful pigment in beet, is an antioxidant that can significantly help your liver get rid of toxins, and thus improve its main function to keep your body clean by absorbing all the harmful chemicals from your blood. Beet also contains betaine, a substance can be used to help with some forms of depression due to its ability to relax your mind and improve general sense of well being.
For healthy reasons we prefer using homemade sauces and condiments to those bought in a supermarket. There is value in making something from scratch, and you can always control what comes in a recipe and what quality product comes out of it. We used homemade pickled red onions for this beet salad. We recommend marinating some onions at the same time as you start cooking beet, or even some time in advance, it can be perfectly stored in the fridge and used for other dishes.
We know that a lot of people out there like beet but don’t like to bother with cooking it because the process seems time and energy consuming. If you are one of those people, we invite you to check out our *How to cook beet* (or Easy ways to cook beet).
We hope you like this beet salad as much as we do, and will learn to love beet not only for its health benefits but also for its taste and color!
Recipe authorVictor ArzutovHow to make it
- 1
Step 1
Place the beet in a pot and cover with water. Bring to the boil and cook the beets until soft (you can easily stick a fork into it). Drain the water and cool slightly. Alternatively use one of our suggested easy ways to cook beet .
- 2
Step 2
Peel and slice the beet into wedges or cut into cubes (if you like, use kitchen gloves for the peeling part to avoid staining your hands pink), cut pear, feta and roughly chop rocket salad.
- 3
Step 3
To make the dressing, combine the oil, honey, lemon juice, salt and mustard, and mix well. Taste and adjust to your liking.
- 4
Step 4
Combine all salad ingredients. Add pickled red onions (you can use our quick pickled red onions recipe to make your own instead of store-bought). When ready to serve, pour the dressing over the salad and toss lightly to combine.
Cooking tips
Cook the beets until tender, then let them cool before combining them with the pear and greens.
Ingredient substitutions
Goat cheese can stand in for feta, giving the salad a creamier, tangier texture.
Questions about this recipe
Do the beets need to be cooked?
Yes. The first step boils them until soft before the salad is assembled.
What adds acidity to the salad?
Pickled red onion, lemon juice, and Dijon mustard balance the sweetness of the beets and pear.
