A Cure For Vegophobia: March 2011

Entrée, Starter or Side

Candy Cane Beat Salad with grilled veggies and goats cheese

What you will need:

4 medium sized candy cane beats (these guys are brilliantly pretty)

2 handfuls cheery tomatoes

Quarter white/Spanish onion sliced

1 green zucchini, peeled and thinly sliced

1 yellow zucchini, peeled and thinly sliced

Half a red bell pepper, cut into large chunks or slices

½ Bag of baby spinach

4 large medallions of goats cheese (disk shapes)

3 TBS Olive oil

1TBS cayenne pepper

Salt & Pepper to taste

Dressing of choice *(I used maple balsamic dressing)

Directions:

Scrub down beats with vegetable scrubber, or with clean wet rag. Cut off top and bottom of beat salvaging as much of the body as you can to slice. Slice beats in medium thickness disks so they will withstand boiling without falling apart.

Bring water in a soup pot to boil; just enough water to cover beats (using full pot of water just takes longer to boil and risks boiling over, and hello it’s wasteful!!! J) Add 1 TBS olive oil, Cayenne pepper and salt to taste into water. Boil beats until fork slides easily through flesh or el dente, (*I don’t like eating mushy food) drain away water and fill pot with cold water then set aside on counter or in sink so beats don’t continue to cook.

Heat up grill pan, BBQ, Oven or in my case Panini grill for grilling your veggies. Grill (BBQ or Bake; on baking sheet) onion, zucchini, and red bell pepper, adding 2 TBS olive oil so it won’t stick to Panini grill. Grill for aprox. 10 minutes until Zucchini are almost falling apart.

Arrange clean, dry baby spinach leaves in two pasta bowls or on plates, cut cherry tomatoes in half’s and arrange evenly on top of spinach. Arrange goats cheese medallions (as a whole disks or crumble), then top with warm grilled veggies, and finish with drained cooled beats slices. Finish with the dressing of your choice and pepper to taste.