When I worked in a restaurant over the Summer, I spent more time with beets than I’d ever thought I would. I would work on preparing them for service for hours. I thought I’d never touch them again until I saw them at the farmers’ market last week and decided to grab some to share my knowledge.

Beets aren’t exactly difficult to prepare, just a bit tedious. First we roasted them in a salt bath. The theory is that the beets absorb the salt, making their sweetness more potent. Whether that worked or not we constantly debated. Once they came out of the oven, we had to peel them, all done by hand while still piping hot. It was not the most fun job to have to do for an hour, and my fingers often looked like I had just committed a murder afterwards.

The other part of beet preparation was the greens. I didn’t know beet greens were even edible; I had always thrown mine away thinking they were poisonous like radish leaves. The proper way to peel a beet green is to pinch the leaves and remove the long, thick, purple spine in the middle. Doing this with one bunch of beets isn’t too troubling; doing it with 30 bunches of beets—well, that was anther story.

Roasted Beets

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 1 hour 10 minutes

Ingredients:

• 1 bunch of beets, stems removed
• 1/2 cup salt

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
2. Pour the salt down on a baking tray.
3. Lay the beets down on top of the salt. Roast for 60-70 minutes until a fork can pass through easily.
4. Remove the tray from the oven and let cool slightly for 5 minutes or so.
5. Gently peel the skin off of the beets using your hands. You might want to use a dish towel to protect your hands from the heat and dye of the beets.

We served our beets in the restaurant in a salad. The salad prepared there had goat cheese and pistachios in it. Since I don’t eat cheese and didn’t have pistachios, I made a modified version with oil and walnuts. The recipe below could work for either variation.

Roasted Beet Salad

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 0 minutes

Ingredients(for 1 serving):

• 6 medium-sized roasted beets, cooled to room temperature
• Greens from one bunch of beets, washed and deveined
• 1/4 cup crumbled goat cheese(optional)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt(omit if using goat cheese)
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil(omit if using goat cheese)
• 2 Tablespoons crushed walnuts or pistachios

Method:

1. Combine all of the ingredients in a large bowl
2. Toss the ingredients until thoroughly mixed together.
3. Plate and serve at room temperature.

If my restaurant experience taught me anything, it’s that I’m perfectly happy eating canned beets. They’re cheaper, more convenient, and just as nutritious. That being said, preparing your own beets from scratch makes for an impressive dish.