I also love beets. They’re an odd, brightly colored, and healthy vegetable, and I will eat them just about any which way. So the odds were very good that I was going to love this dish, which is an appetizer involving beets. Yes, please.

The cooking time here is long, but nearly all of it is totally hands off. The main step in cooking is “throw everything in a food processor,” and you don’t exactly need to be Jean-Georges to pull this one off. So take the plunge and start making some appetizers at home if you don’t already. This spread is the perfect place to start: The experimenting has already been done for you, and I can promise good results.

Despite how much I love appetizers, I seldom make them. Food Junta is targeted toward busy people, because Claire and I are busy people. I love cooking a meal at home, but not so much that I want to spend 100% of my free time doing it. As a result, I tend toward one course meals supplemented with a vegetable or a salad or maybe both. “Whipping up some quick crostini” isn’t really a thought that crosses my mind at 6 pm on a Tuesday when I already have the rest of a meal to cook.

But I’m trying to do more appetizing in the kitchen, and there are some aspects of appetizers that are making this easier: They generally require fewer ingredients, fewer steps, and less (or even no) cooking. They frequently can be prepared completely or almost completely ahead of time. Finally – and somewhat counter-intuitively – I’ve actually found they make cooking dinner for other people to be a lot easier. But wait, you say, how can cooking more food make cooking easier?

Here’s how: No matter how carefully I plan, I always take longer getting a meal on the table for guests than I anticipate because I fail to factor in the time it takes me to welcome people, get them settled, fix them a drink, etc. This leaves me feeling rushed and anxious to get food out to my hungry guests. Not that my dinner guests have ever been impatient, but I think anyone who has ever hosted a dinner party knows exactly the feeling I mean. But, throw an appetizer or two in front of these people, and you can buy yourself all the time you need. By giving them something to nosh on, you can assuage your guilt about leaving them hanging and also – as is desperately needed with some guests – keep them out of the kitchen and out of your way.

“Here’s some beet spread, folks. Go wild, and I’ll see you in 20 minutes.”

Roasted Beet Spread
Adapted from the Bromberg Bros. Blue Ribbon Cookbook

3 medium beets (1 cup roasted)
1 medium red pepper (1/2 cup roasted)
1 medium red onion (1/2 cup roasted)
Salt and pepper

1. Roast the peppers over the flame of a gas burner, on a hot grill, or under the broiler, until the skin is black and charred. (The more you char, the easier the skin will be to remove.) Remove from the heat and place in a large bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit until cool enough to handle, about 15 to 20 minutes. With clean paper towels, wipe off the skin. Remove the stems and seeds and discard. If necessary, briefly rinse under cold water to remove any remaining charred skin. Slice or chop.

2. Rinse beets to remove loose dirt. Roast them whole and unpeeled in a 400 degree oven for about 90 minutes, or until you can pierce them through the middle easily with a butter knife. I wrap mine in aluminum foil and place them in a baking sheet, as beets tend to let off a fair amount of liquid and beet juice is a beetch to clean up. Let them cool, cut the tops off, and then the skins should be easy to remove with your fingers. Finally give them a rough chop, just small enough to go into the food processor.

3. After you start the beets in the oven, slice the onion, toss with a tablespoon of olive oil, place on a baking sheet or dish, and put in the oven with the beets. Cook until very soft. Cooking time will vary a lot depending on the oven, but mine took about an hour.

4. Combine beets, red pepper, and red onion in food processor. Add salt and pepper to taste. Process. If mixture is too think, add some olive oil. Taste and adjust seasoning. Chill. (The dip is good warm, but I think its better cold.)

5. Serve with warm pita.

This FJ contributor has recently moved to San Francisco and has discovered, amidst the dazzling array of California produce, the splendors of beets. One of the “11 healthiest foods you aren’t eating,” a root vegetable that is flavorful and satisfying, and of a reddish-purple hue brilliant enough to brighten up the San Francisco January rain, beets are a winner on all fronts.

This past week I made a beet and feta cheese salad that was hearty, delicious, and so easy. Aliza Green’s nifty little Field Guide to Produce suggested that beets went well with goat cheese, and this suggestion was right on. I consulted several other cookbooks for the basics of roasting beets (which I had never done before), and came up with a simple plan. So simple, that it requires only 5 ingredients:

3 medium sized beets

About half a cup of feta cheese

Olive oil

Balsamic vinegar

1 lemon

Here’s how you prepare the beets:

Preheat your oven to 350

Scrub the beets clean under cold water

Place them in a baking dish

Pour about a quarter cup of water into the bottom of the dish, to keep the beets from sticking to the dish

Put dish in oven

Depending on your oven, the beets should take around an hour, as did mine. I knew they were done when I could easily pierce them with a fork. When you take the beets out, run them under cold water and then peel off their skin.

Now, you are ready to create your salad:

Chop the beets into cubes of about a half-inch and put in a salad bowl

Crumble or chop your feta and mix it with the beets

Dress with lemon juice, olive oil and balsamic vinegar until it’s just right!

This dish came out wonderfully. The saltiness of the cheese complemented the slightly sweet nature of the beets while the lemon and balsamic gave it a great little tang. (Or, if you’re looking for an even simpler version, try Kevin’s uber-minimalist take on beet salad.)

I served this dish with sauteed broccoli (boil a head of broccoli for one minute to make it tender, cut it into smaller florets, sautee in garlic and oil, add some chili flakes) and with a dill-yogurt raita (sprinkle some salt and fresh dill into a cup of yogurt; thin it with some water); a combination that worked very well.  Furthermore, it looked pretty: a medley of green and purple and white.  Highly recommended!

…the multitudinous seas incarnadine.

Macbeth was talking about his bloody hand, but beets are pretty incarnadinacious in their own right. Just have a look at this pasta. No food coloring. No photoshop. That’s just pasta that’s absorbed beet juice, which I suppose – if you’re getting picky – is pretty much food coloring after all.

But it sure is red isn’t it? It’s also delicious. Beety, creamy, and al dente, it’s a great way to transition into fall cooking.

I’ve been getting a beet or two every week in my CSA and had been letting them accumulate in my crisper. I’d roast a few every so often, but I was getting sick of roasted beets and eager for something else to do with them.

I found this recipe on epicurious.com, which is a site I can’t say enough good things about. So I won’t try. Just go check it out. A great resource for when you’re feeling uninspired.

Unlike most recipes I make, where I feel comfortable omitting just about as many ingredients as I like, I’m going to go ahead and say that both the lemon juice and the cayenne pepper are critical here. You could live without the parsley flavor-wise, but it would be a real aesthetic loss.

If only all of our food could look so much like Christmas…

Tagliatelle with Shredded Beets, Sour Cream, and Parsley
From Bon Appétit

1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 cups (packed) coarsely grated peeled uncooked beets (about 3 large)
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
12 ounces tagliatelle or fettuccine
1 8-ounce container sour cream
6 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley, divided

1. Melt butter with oil in large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add garlic; stir until pale golden, about 1 minute.

2. Add beets and cayenne; reduce heat to medium-low and sauté just until beets are tender, about 12 minutes. Stir in lemon juice. Meanwhile, cook pasta in large pot of boiling salted water until tender but still firm to bite, stirring occasionally.

3. Drain pasta and return to pot. Stir in sour cream and 4 tablespoons parsley, then beet mixture. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Transfer pasta to bowl.

4. Sprinkle with remaining 2 tablespoons parsley and serve.