Amazingly Tasty Salad You Must Make this Holiday Season

Last week I posted a recipe for the white salad, or potato salad with a twist, so I thought to myself: I may be on a roll here so why not share a recipe of a different color salad this week? After all, it is another appetizer that is highly popular and actually healthy, too. Drum roll please…

Introducing the Red Salad!

Unlike the white salad, I am not sure if there is an equivalent of the red salad in the American cuisine. The red salad gets its name from the main ingredient – beets. Now before you start crinkling your nose, hear me out. Beets are a root vegetable, which is awesome both fresh in late summer and matured in the winter months. Lithuanians have mastered utilizing every part of the beet – from the root to the leaves – and making delicious dishes from it. Think cold beet soup in the summer, just a plain old beet soup (we call it “barščiai”) in the winter, beets with beans, beet salad with potatoes, or sauerkraut, or peas or anything else that comes to mind; not to mention beet juice and using it in place of blush on your face in the olden days (thank goodness for modern day cosmetics!:). I think I have enough recipes with beets as the main ingredient to prepare a feast!

The Red Salad also takes an honorable place on a holiday table, especially during the Christmas time in Lithuania.

So here is the recipe. 

Ingredients

4-5 medium beets, cooked, peeled and grated (you may also use canned, if you prefer)

1 large carrot, shredded

1 onion, diced

1 apple, peeled (I used Granny Smith)

Salt

Pepper

Parsley, optional

Olive oil, 2 tbsp

Preparation

1. Place beets in a pot with water, bring it to a boil, reduce the heat and let them cook until soft (you may check by with a fork).
2. Allow beets to cool a bit. When they are no longer too hot to touch, peel them and grate them into a large bowl.
3. Peel and grate the carrot and apple.

4. Peel and dice the onion.

5. Heat oil in a skillet and place onions in it. Cook until translucent. Add the carrots and cook until soft. While cooking, season with salt, pepper and parsley.

6. Mix beets, apple and cooked onions and carrots together.

7. Enjoy this refreshing salad! It goes well as an appetizer or a side for any meat dish.

Your turn!

Do you like beets? If so, what do you make with them?