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winter salad

Salad #2 Shredded Yellow Beet, Carrot and Apple Salad with Orange Ginger Dressing

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For our second salad I went in search of something to use the yellow beets that I had gotten from Eagle Creek Farm’s Winter CSA. Winter is not the easiest time to create a seasonal salad, but there is still quite a bit you can work with, beets included.

I came across a couple recipes for shredded beet salads. Now I’m no stranger to beets. I grew up on pickled beets and grew and roasted beets when I had my very first garden. But I had absolutely no idea that you could shred beets and eat them raw. At first I had thought this would fall into the category of, you can but would you want to (sort of like raw chicken, yeah, you can eat it raw but…).

But in fact when they are shredded they are very similar to the carrots. And yes, you can also use purple beets.

Shredded Yellow Beet, Carrot and Apple Salad with Ginger Orange Dressing Recipe

(adapted from Simply Recipes Morrocan Beet Salad)

Shredded Yellow Beet, Carrot and Apple Salad with Ginger Orange Dressing

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Salad #2 Shredded Yellow Beet, Carrot and Apple Salad with Orange Ginger Dressing
Recipe type: Salad
 
Ingredients
  • 1 large beet
  • 2 large carrots
  • 1 apple (I like granny smith)

  • Orange Ginger Dressing

  • ½ teaspoon paprika
  • ¼ teaspoon ground cumin
  • ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
  • pinch of salt
  • pinch of cayenne
  • juice of 1 orange
  • 2 tbsp honey
Instructions
  1. Peel and shred the carrots, beets and apples (the apple will also need to be cored). The beet will shred better if you cut it into smaller pieces first, think steak fries. If you have some kind of kitchen gadget to shred things, that would be handy. Put everything you've shredded into a large bowl.
  2. Add the ingredients for your dressing into a small bowl and blend well.
  3. Pour the dressing over your salad ingredients and mix. You will end up with quite a bit of dressing. You can use it all, it doesn't hurt for the salad to marinate in the fridge a little, and it can keep it from drying out or you can just add what you need if you are using it right away.

Alternatives:

  • If you are keeping it for a while you may want to use raisins instead of the apple, it’ll still taste fine, but the color goes a bit off over time.
  • You could also make the dressing as simply recipes did with lemon juice instead of orange juice and cinnamon instead of ginger
  • If you have a baby under 12 months you may want to substitute the honey for corn syrup, rogers golden syrup or maple syrup (I forgot so didn’t give it to Nicky).

Did they eat it?

Gordie (3.5 years): Tried some of the shredded vegetables before I put the dressing on it and made it into a salad.

Stephen: “Good. Cool and refreshing.”

Dana: I liked this salad. It was a real surprise as I didn’t expect much. It was pretty heavy on the ginger, I might reduce it if I was going to make it again. 2 down 51 to go.

Salad #1 – Roasted Sweet Potato and Cranberry Salad Recipe – 52 Salads

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I’ve decided to embark on a challenge to make 52 different salads over the next 52 weeks. I was inspired by my friend Misty’s 52 cakes challenge and my friend Jenny’s 52 cookies challenge. They sounded like so much fun I decided to do one of my own. But 52 weeks of cookies and cakes was not going to help me with my fitness goals for this year, so I’m going to do 52 salads instead.

I love salads, but I often find myself too lazy and disorganized to actually make them. I’m going to use this challenge to help me get in the habit of making salads and getting my family to eat more vegetables.

Additionally, my three year old son Gordie turns his nose up at anything labeled a salad so I’m going to try to see if I can win him over and
get him to try some salads.

For this challenge I am going to try to:

  • Make really different salads rather than subtle variations
  • Use a variety of sources for inspiration
  • Use seasonally available ingredients
  • Focus on salads with lots of vegetables that would work as a snack or side dish and will keep a few days in the fridge.

At least for the time being I’ll also be choosing salads that are dairy free as Nicky is sensitive to dairy products.

I’m taking suggestions so if you have a favorite salad that I should try please let me know!

Now onto our first salad:

This salad was inspired by one that they make at Sunterra Market. They use green peppers which is quite pretty but the ones at the store when I went were all squishy. That’s one of the things that’s so great about making salads, a recipe is really only a guideline.

Roasted Sweet Potato and Cranberry Salad

Roasted Sweet Potato and Cranberry Salad

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Salad #1 – Roasted Sweet Potato and Cranberry Salad Recipe – 52 Salads
Recipe type: Salad
 
Ingredients
  • 1 large sweet potato cubed and roasted
  • 1-2 red or green peppers chopped
  • 1-2 green onion sliced
  • handful of dried cranberries
  • handful of pumpkin seeds
  • Maple Dijon Dressing
  • ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 Tbsp maple syrup
  • 1 tsp dijon mustard
  • 2 tsp white wine vinegar (or red wine or just white vinegar)
  • salt and pepper
Instructions
  1. Mix the salad ingredients in a large bowl. Whisk, blend of shake the dressing ingredients together until they are well mixed. Use your hands to cover the salad with the dressing. You will probably have a bit more than you really need.
  2. Note: When you are roasting the sweet potatoes test them often, you want them to be cooked but not mushy or they will just fall apart in the salad.

Did they eat it?

Gordie (3.5 years): Did not try it because it is a salad even though I presented him with just a piece of sweet potato

Nicky (10 months): Loved it, sweet potato and red peppers were a huge hit

Stephen: “Good. Doesn’t really seem like a salad though.”

Dana: I adore this salad. I would absolutely make it again. Aside from having to roast the sweet potatoes it’s super easy to throw together too.

So there you have it – 1 down 51 to go.