Roasted Beets with Pink Grapefruit (from The Side Gardener)
There is a restaurant just down the street from my house in downtown Vancouver. It’s arguably “upscale,” chi-chi. It’s called Nightingale, and it’s owned by the same folks that own one of the fanciest restaurants in town, Hawksworth.
I know there’s a cache to going to these kinds of restos; you’ll often see people there celebrating a special occasion like a birthday or an anniversary. All that is good, but I tend to me more of an “let’s celebrate every day, low key” kinda gal, so despite being a pretty big foodie, I don’t actually go to these kinds of places much. I did, however, have a meal at Nightingale a few months back, last year.
One of the things that surprised me about the experience was how vegetable-forward the menu was. As a vegetarian, I expect that there are going to be at least a few menu options for me, but I always expect that the bulk of the menu will be based around proteins, and that those proteins will be meat. At Nightingale, meat felt like a side-dish, the veggies were the star.
One of the dishes I tried there was a roasted beet salad. It was served on a bed of whipped feta, and garnished with orange slices, dill and an everything crumble. It was so good. Beets have a lot of sugar, so when you roast them, they get quite sweet. There was just a lovely balance of sweet, the acidity from the orange, the fatty saltiness of the whipped feta, and the crunch of the everything crumble.
I’ve thought about that dish a lot, which is always a good sign.
Fast forward to last week when I got a copy of Rosie Daykin‘s new cookbook, The Side Gardener (I’m reviewing it for BC Review). Rosie, like many of us, took up a project during the pandemic, and her project was gardening. Now, a few years later, she wrote a whole book about it, including recipes, and guess what one of the recipes in the book is? Roasted Beets with Pink Grapefruit.
It gives very similar vibes to the one I had at Nightengale, with a few notable exceptions. The beets are roasted whole, instead of being cut and roasted on a pan. I think if I were to make this again, I’d try that method, as I like the caramelization on each individual piece. Secondly, she uses grapefruit for the citrus instead of orange, but I prefer grapefruit, so cool.
This recipe brought to you by the beets I got at the first farmer’s market of the season (yay! farmer’s market season!)
Here’s the recipe for the Roasted Beets with Pink Grapefruit, and look for a full cookbook review coming soon on BC Review…
If you like this one, check out Rosie’s recipe for Ginger Cookies, it’s a fave of mine.
Roasted Beets with Pink Grapefruit
Ingredients
- 3 large beets
- 2 tbsp olive oil plus a drizzle
- 1/2 tsp salt plus extra
- 1/2 tsp pepper plus extra
- 1 cup plain yogurt
- 1/4 cup crumbled feta cheese
- zest of one lemon
- 1 tbsp white wine vinegar
- 1 large pink grapefruit peeled and cut into segments
- 2 tbsp pistachios roughly chopped
- 1 tbsp fresh mint leaves torn
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Scrub your beets well and top and tail them. Place the beets on a sheet of foil and drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and wrap the foil up to form a tight packet. Roast in a preheated oven for about 45 minutes, or until fork-tender.
- Remove the beets from the oven and set aside until they are cool enough to handle. Peel the skin off with a paring knife, and cut each into 8 pieces.
- In a small bowl, whisk together yogurt, feta and lemon zest.
- In another small bowl, whisk together 2 tbsp olive oil, the white wine vinegar and 1/2 tsp each of the salt and pepper.
- Spread the yogurt mixture onto a large plate.
- Arrange the roasted beets and the grapefruit on the plate over the yogurt. Sprinkle with pistachios, drizzle with dressing, and garnish with torn mint leaves.