Roasted Beetroot Salad With Walnuts And Feta

The perfect summer salad! Roasted Beetroot Salad is delicious, low calorie, and loaded with nutritious ingredients. It's the perfect dish for hot summer days when you want to enjoy a light, refreshing lunch that takes around 30 minutes to prepare. You can also serve Beetroot feta salad as a side with lamb kabobs, grilled chicken, or other protein.

Beets! It seems people either love beets or hate them. When describing beets, the haters would say they "taste like dirt." But for those of us that love beets, we would argue beets have an "earthy taste." However, roasting beets is a game changer! It really mellows out their earthiness and brings out their candy-like sweetness.

A few weeks ago, my sister, Rosa, told me about her new favorite salad, beetroot salad! It consisted of sliced boiled beets, walnuts, and sliced red onions. The dressing is made with pomegranate molasses, olive oil, and lemon juice. After trying it her way, I decided to tweak it to my liking.

I made a small serving with boiled beets, another with raw beets, and one with roasted beets. As you've probably guessed, I prefer the roasted beet salad.

I still wasn't quite satisfied with the recipe so I added a spring mix, fresh mint, feta cheese, and candied walnuts. Mmmm, almost there! I tweaked the dressing by adding salt, black pepper, and fresh garlic. Yup, it's a winner! If you think you don't like beets, give beets a second glance and try them roasted!

🧐 Why This Recipe Works

• This beetroot salad recipe is super easy to prepare. If you prepare the dressing and roast the beets ahead of time, all you have to do is toss the ingredients together when you're ready to serve it.
• Beets are loaded with vitamins and minerals as well as antioxidants which are known to lower your risks of cancer and heart disease!
• Beets are a great source of fiber, so they're very filling. This is very helpful when you're trying to lose weight.
• Besides being delicious, this salad is so pretty! It can be served as a meal or as a side dish.

🛒 What You Need For This Recipe

🔖 Recipe Ingredients and Substitutions

• Beets: Beets are easy to grow in your garden and readily available in most grocery stores. You'll need about 4 small to medium beets.
• Greens: Choose from spring mix, baby spinach, or Romaine lettuce.
• Cheese: Feta, blue cheese, or goat cheese are all great additions to this salad.
• Herbs: I added mint but you can try Italian parsley, cilantro, or basil. It just depends on what you like!
• Dressing: The easy dressing consists of pomegranate molasses which has a tangy and sweet flavor. Besides Amazon, you can find pomegranate molasses in most Middle Eastern markets. You might as well get a bottle because you'll find it in many of my recipes. The dressing also has fresh lemon juice and olive oil. Avocado oil would be great too!
• Nuts: Candied walnuts are super easy to make. I toasted one cup of walnuts with ½ cup of brown sugar, 2 tablespoons butter, a pinch of salt, and a smidgen (I always wanted to use that word) of cayenne pepper. If you prefer, you can substitute plain walnuts, pecans, or slivered almonds.

🥗 How To Make Roasted Beetroot Salad

STEP 1: Wash beetroots and scrub with a vegetable brush then dry with paper towels. Using a sharp knife, slice the tops and bottoms off of the beets then slice them in half. Next, slice each half into ¼" sections. Brush both sides with olive oil and arrange on a foil or parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake for 25 minutes in a 400-degrees F. oven then cool completely.

Pro Tip: If you decide to boil the beets, place cleaned beets in a pot and cover with cool water. Bring to a boil for 45 minutes or until fork tender. Remove from the pot and either peel the beets or simply wipe them off with a paper towel which will easily remove their skin. When roasting beets, it's not necessary to peel them unless you want to.

STEP 2: While the beets are baking, prepare the vinaigrette by whisking olive oil, pomegranate molasses, lemon juice, crushed garlic, salt, and black pepper until emulsified.

STEP 3: If using plain walnuts, toast for a few minutes in a hot skillet until fragrant. Optionally, you can use candied walnuts, pecans, or slivered almonds.

STEP 4: Add spring mix to a salad bowl, top with sliced red onion, mint leaves, and cooled roasted beets. Sprinkle the beetroot salad with crumbled or cubed feta cheese and nuts. Drizzle with the vinaigrette and serve immediately.

🤷🏻‍♀️ Recipe FAQs

Beet Side Effects

Although beets are considered a superfood by many, there are some things to consider.

• Overconsumption of beets can lead to kidney stones.
• Eating too many beets can sometimes cause stomach upset.
• Beets are known for having a diuretic effect so don't overindulge on beets before getting on a road trip!
• Commonly used as a dyeing agent, beets are not only great for dying Easter eggs, and pickled turnips, but they also have a tendency to dye urine or stools pink or red. This is especially true when eaten in large amounts. So if you find this to be the case, no need to call on your doctor, it's totally normal!

👩🏼‍🍳 Recipe Pro Tips

• Beetroot feta salad can be prepared with raw, boiled, or roasted beets. Although I like the crunch of raw beets, overall I preferred the sweetness of the roasted beetroot salad.
• Once the walnuts and dressing are added to the salad, it should be served immediately, otherwise, the greens will wilt and the walnuts will soften over time.
• If it's easier, you can skip making the dressing and use your favorite store-bought salad dressing instead.
• Serve this roasted beetroot feta salad topped with grilled chicken to increase the amount of protein per serving.

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