Winter beet salad with goat’s cheese dressing

Name: Winter beet salad with goat's cheese dressing
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 40 min
Total time: 50 min
Yield: 2 -6 (depending on how served)
Ingredients: 2 beet (medium); 4 handfuls mixed salad leaves (approx, eg spring mix); 1 bulb fennel (small); 1 persimmon (fuyu - the smaller tomato-shaped ones that you can eat when still firm); 1/2 cup hazelnuts (70g); 4 tbsp goats cheese (60g); 2 tbsp milk; 2 tbsp olive oil; 2 tsp honey; 2 tsp wine vinegar

November 19, 2017 by Caroline's Cooking 35 Comments

This winter beet salad is short on ingredients but full of flavor. From earthy beets to fragrant persimmon, all topped off with a delicious creamy goats cheese dressing. Great for lunch or as a side.

I don’t know about you, but I am starting to feel the effects of having made lots of cookies, panettone and other sweeter things recently (a side effect of blogging, baking Christmas cookies early!). I have done my best to give quite a few away, and the kids are all too happy to help out, but I’ll be honest I am all too tempted by them myself to resist. True, the odd cookie is not a bad thing but it’s a daily habit at the moment which isn’t really me. I don’t know if I’m weird but I get sugar headaches. But it has some benefits as I then start plotting healthy foods to compensate, such as this great big beet salad that I had for lunch recently. And they, too, can be delicious discoveries.

Beet salad: the perfect salad for colder weather

I know, salads can feel out of place at this time of year. But to me, it’s more a matter of picking the right seasonal ingredients and they can then still be just what you need. A beet salad, for instance, feels much more at home this time of year. Particularly when you add in things like persimmon and fennel, as I have here. Top it off with a delicious, creamy goat’s cheese dressing and you have a perfect winter salad.

How it’s made

This winter beet salad is incredibly easy to prepare with only 5 ingredients in the salad and the same in the dressing. I think roast beets (or the full name beetroot as I we’d say in the UK) are much better flavor-wise for this salad. I appreciate that means a little more work than say buying ready-cooked beets, but you can still make it easy by roasting a day or two ahead of time and keep them refrigerated. Just add them in the oven when you are cooking something else. When you’re ready to eat, you just slice a few things, toast the hazelnuts and whisk together the dressing and that’s it.

If you can’t get hazelnuts then you could substitute them with walnuts or pecans. I do think hazelnuts are the better flavor match, though. They’re also better toasted, though this can be skipped too if you’re in a rush.

While I had this beet salad for lunch (and polished off a great big bowl of it), it would also make a great appetizer or side dish. It would be a great salad for entertaining as it’s so easy but has lots of color and flavor. It’s mild enough, though, to work with many other flavors.

Whenever you choose to serve it, this winter beet salad is truly delicious. It’s got so many textures and flavors for so few ingredients – the crunch of the salad leaves and fennel, the soft sweet persimmon, the earthy roast beetroot and the creamy rich goat’s cheese dressing with a slight sweetness from honey. It’s a wonderful bowl of tasty goodness that certainly helps balance out the cookies. In fact so much so, I’m craving more as I write.

This winter beet salad has only 5 ingredients but is full of great flavors from earthy beets to fragrant persimmon, topped with a delicious creamy goats cheese dressing.

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5 from 2 votes