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Hello, my name is Angela. It’s very nice to meet you.
Lately I’m enjoying…
- Sunshine
- Walks around the neighbourhood
- Bunny spottings
- Epsom salt baths before bed
- Homemade juice
- Fresh hair do’s
- Homemade Lemon Sugar Scrub on face and body
- Purging unwanted household items for donation
- Horses on the farm
- Melting snow and peeking grass
- Tea with girlfriends
- Deep stretches
- Anything no bake, especially date squares!
- Colour on my plate and in my closet
- Red and Gold BEETS
What are you enjoying lately?
This week, the sun is back and the temperature seems to be ever so slowly creeping upwards. Five degrees and sunshine? I’ll take it. And I’ll raise you 20 degrees. bahaha.
This better not be an April Fool’s joke because I’m finally ready for Spring…bring it on!
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Yesterday, I was in such good spirits, all I could think about was making an energizing raw salad to fit my mood. I always feel so uplifted when I eat salads, so I thought I could take it to a new level with this fun beet, carrot, and apple salad served over a bed of greens.
My relationship with beets growing up was a rocky one and I occasionally still have nightmares about the pseudo Jell-O canned beets my dad used to encourage me to try. Last year, I fell in love with beets when I started to juice with them. After juicing, I got a bit more daring and tried this amazing cooked beet salad at Karyn’s on Green in Chicago. Things have been going pretty well in our relationship, so I decided to put my fears aside and give a raw beet salad a shot! Who knows, maybe we’d take our relationship to a whole new level?
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Spring Clean Raw Beet, Carrot, & Apple Salad
Adapted from Chocolate and Zucchini.
Ingredients:
- 2 medium carrots, peeled
- 1 large red beet, peeled
- 1 large golden beet, peeled
- 1 apple (sweet variety), chopped
- 1 garlic clove, minced (or less if you are not a garlic fan)
- 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 2 tsp fresh lemon juice
- 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- Red pepper flakes, to taste (I used a couple shakes)
- 1/2 tbsp pure maple syrup, to taste
- Kosher salt & freshly ground black pepper, to taste (I used about 1/4 tsp salt)
- 2-3 tbsp Sesame seeds
- 3-4 tbsp Chopped almonds
Directions:
1. Trim, peel, and grate the carrots and beets. You can use a food processor with a grater attachment if preferred). Chop apple and place the grates beets, carrot, and chopped apple into a large bowl.
2. Assemble the dressing by whisking together the minced garlic, EVOO, lemon juice, vinegar, red pepper flakes, maple syrup, salt, and pepper. Adjust dressing to taste. Pour the dressing onto the vegetables and mix well. Allow to sit for at least a half hour so the flavours can develop.
3. Add in your desired seeds and nuts and serve chilled or at room temperature over a bed of greens. Makes 2 servings.
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This would be a good time to whip out those ginormous lunch lady gloves that are supposed to be a size ‘small’. ;)
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Creepy, yet functional. And no pink stained hands!
Oh…Eric tells me that I forgot to mention an OXO gadget yesterday. I did it on purpose because I never use this thing!
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Meet the Apple Slicer. Eric LOVES this gadget and I make fun of him for being too lazy to slice an apple. I mean, do we really need to save time slicing an apple? Are apples difficult to slice? I never see a need to use it, but he uses it all the time and constantly raves about it. I used it yesterday for this salad and I have to admit it was a bit fun. ;) Shhh don’t tell him I said that.
Sometimes I put produce stickers on it to annoy him. Remember, our war? It rages on my friends.
For this salad, you can grate everything by hand and kick it old school like I did or you can use a food processor if you have a grate attachment.
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Note to self: Figure out how to use processor grate attachment stat.
At the last minute, I mixed in a hefty portion of sesame seeds and some chopped almonds for some healthy fats and protein. The chopped almonds gave it a nice texture and crunch!
When I first tried this salad, I was not very impressed. It just tasted a bit off and the flavour wasn’t what I expected after using so many wonderful seasonings. I read the original recipe and I realized that it said to let the salad stand for about 30 minutes to let the flavours develop!
Ah, this made sense. And you know what? It rocked my world after letting it stand for about 30-40 minutes and it was even better several hours later when I had it with dinner. It was a bit sweet, a bit tangy, a bit spicy, and a bit garlicky. Somehow it just worked for me. I really had a kick to my step after eating this! I enjoyed it with an Ezekiel English muffin with hummus.
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I’m off to see my doctor about my tailbone. I am happy to report that my tailbone pain has improved quite a bit over the past several days. I’m doing lots of back stretches twice a day as well as Epsom salt baths and light walking. Sitting is not good for the back, so I have been trying to stay active on my feet and get up from the desk frequently to stretch. Today, I’m hoping to get the approval from the doc to do some non-impact elliptical exercise at the gym until I’m back to 100%. This girl needs to sweat!
Coming up: One of my favourite baked goods so far in 2011. They have no refined flour, no white sugar, no added fat, no soy, and can be made gluten-free to boot. :)
I completely fell in love with beets after I got over my fear of their exterior! Now, I roast them, juice them, grate them over salads. They top my list of favorite veggies, right next to kale! :) check out my blog for a beet-veggie-burger recipe! http://thegfpseudovegan.blogspot.com/2011/03/still-cold-still-craving-winter-veggies.html
I love my apple slicer :) It is not lazy at all-it is resourceful!! haha
OH my my…that LAST photo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
With all this talk of beets, I can’t help but be reminded of Dwight from the Office :D
Delicious! However, I did add some sesame seed oil because it just sounded soo good at the time I made it, and I just added some of Gena’s cashew cream (http://www.choosingraw.com/roasted-cauliflower-and-parsnip-soup/) since it was sitting next to the salad in the fridge when I went to grab it and Oh My Gosh,… I can’t get enough of this Yumminess!!!
yum sounds great!
I am slowly starting to like beets. Juice is ok, and cooked beets are all right too. One day I might love them. Maybe this salad will help?
That looks delicious! I think this would be the perfect opportunity to figure out how to use the shredder attachment on my food processor. Can’t be that difficult, right?? Love the lunch lady gloves, lol. By the way, I brought the No Bake Date Squares into work and everyone LOVED them. I think I loved them the most which is why I had to bring them to work or I probably would have eaten the entire batch.
I only recently fell in love with beets. I roasted them and they were incredible. And then I started juicing with them and I liked em even more! I has some on my salad at WF last weekend and another positive experience! This looks super fresh too! I will have to try it! I always love your suggestions angela!
Angela,
just wanted to share one of my latests treats-yum!
I saute lots of bits of kale in a little olive oil,
add sriracha to taste ( and sometimes a little maple syrup)and then
top it with crunchy organice peanut butter -which melts into the
kale and tastes AMAZING with the spicy sriracha,crunchy pb
and beautiful kale.
I hope you try this….I will keep reading to see :)
Bon appetit!
I just so happened to have all the ingredients at home so I made this salad for dinner last night. So good mixed with cold quinoa and garbanzo beans!
Oh Angela I just LOVE the list of things you are enjoying lately! And your pics are totally beautiful :)
C’mon spring, hurry up so that we can enjoy you even more!
YAY for Sugar Scrubs! I make my own Sugar scrub for my face by just adding a little sugar to my face wash! Works like wonders! :D
I know I would love this salad because my favourite juice is apple beetroot and carrot – ABC – I even don’t bother about getting beetroot juice on my hands – it washes out quickly enough – enjoy the sunshine!
Hi Angela — I discovered your blog just a short time ago and absolutely love it . . . just tried this raw beet salad yesterday and can’t believe how good it was!! Even my (very non-veg!) family loved it :-) . . . I was vegan for all of last year and then went back to being “just vegetarian” but your blog has inspired me to think about returning . . . I missed the way I felt eating that way (I think I’m suffering from dairy “sludge” once again :-) Thanks for all the great recipes and inspiration!
I just made this and OH WOW! Amazing!!!! :) Thanks for sharing :)
Thanks for this recipe – I made it for lunch today and it rocked my world too! I made a few adjustments – I used only red beets because that was all I had on hand, and I subbed in pumpkin seeds and chopped pecans for some of the sesame seeds and almonds, and roasted all the nuts and seeds first. It was so delicious! :-)
I loved this! My husband, who mainly likes vegetables in cooked form and hates sweet things, actually really liked this! I think the key is that it’s a very balanced salad – a little tangy, a little salty and a little sweet. Plus great textures!
This was delicious! I ended up getting very large beets, so it was a *big* batch, and I still had tons left over, even after serving it at a small dinner party. Because I didn’t think beets would freeze well, I decided to add it to a pretty standard lunch I make, and the results were amazing! I took a version of my quick quinoa salad (quinoa, tahini, olive oil, salt, red pepper) w/ any green veggie (broccoli, peas and spinach are my go-tos), and then just added in the beet salad! SO YUMMY!
After discovering your website through the CLEAN diet community, I have been a daily follower…Thanks so much for your daily glow!
Angela, I made this the other day and thought it was great! I loved the dressing instantly. My husband thought it was yummy, too. Perfect for hot weather when I don’t feel like turning the oven on. Now all I have to do is get some plastic gloves like you!
As a variation, I would use orange juice, ginger, and sesame oil. It was very tasty with garlic.