Beet & Brussels Sprouts Salad

There are SO MANY ways to do a good meal-worthy salad. I personally believe that raw nutrients are better than cooked stuff...even if the calories and vitamin/minerals are reportedly the same whether cooked or raw. Being Asian, I still eat a lot of COOKED vegetables....but I'm exploring the raw side now. I'm used to eating raw spinach salad....but beets and brussel sprouts were always consumed cooked. After seeing a few recipes for eating these items raw, I came up with this salad to see how it goes:

Beets - peeled and cut into matchsticks
Brussels sprouts - sliced very thinly, like slaw
Apple - thin slices
Spinach
Pine nuts
 
Dressing:
Mustard
Garlic
Tahini
Apple cider vinegar
Maple syrup

The dressing was completely eye-balled and adjusted to taste....but I really really liked the dressing. And when tossed with the salad...I thought it was a very tasty, earthy, hearty salad. My husband mostly agrees...until he realized I used raw brussel sprouts. "No wonder!! Something tasted off. I don't like that earthy bitter taste." Well, to each their own. Maybe next time I'll blanche the sprouts first?

Beet Salad

The problem with salads is that it's hard to get full on them. Well, it used to be. I came across this salad in the book "Meals that Heal" by Julie Daniluk. I didn't have all the ingredients but I had the key item: Red beets.

So I went to work in grating and chopping up a bunch of different fruits and veggies:
Red Beets
Carrots
Apple
Celery
Salt and Lemon Juice to season
 

Put a big scoop of it onto some greens, sprinkle some Tamari almonds and voila, a very hearty salad. I can eat it without the greens...but it's prettier with some contrasting colors. Enjoy!

Christmas Roasted Veggie Medley (fake)

Yes this is a "fake" roasted veggie medley because only one of the ingredients was actually roasted. I pan seared the brussel sprouts in my favorite way. Then I heated leftover roasted beets in a pot with some frozen corn niblets. Tossed everything together and voila! The perfect dish to bring to a Christmas potluck or for Christmas dinner. =)

Brussels Sprouts
Fish sauce
Olive Oil
Sugar

Roasted beets
Frozen corn

I accidently got some burn marks on the beets and corn in the unattended pot, but hey, now it looks convincingly roasted to match the brussel sprouts! It's the colours of Christmas, it's healthy...and delicious.

Roasted Red and Yellow Beets

Apologies...this went straight into the stomach before I remembered to take a photo.... =) I love eating beets....especially cold pickled beets in the summer. However it being cold enough as it is, I wanted to make hot beets. So roasting them made perfect sense.

Red and Yellow Beets (peeled and cubed)
Salt
Olive Oil
Black Pepper

Everything was tossed together in a roasting pan and then baked at 375 F, covered in foil for the first 45 min. I gave it a stir then baked it another 20 min without the foil. The result was a beautifully colored dish and the beets were so sweet!