By Maureen Clancy

Pity the lowly beet. Just when this rather homey tuber thought it was finally getting the recognition it deserved in home kitchens and trend-setting restaurants - I mean, who among us hasn’t eaten a roasted beet salad with blue cheese and walnuts in the last six months? — along comes the newly elected Barack Obama to declare it off limits.

“I always avoid eating them,” he’s been quoted in the press as saying, relegating beets to the joke mill occupied until now by George H.W. Bush’s uneaten broccoli crowns.

Obama must have been too busy campaigning to catch the New York Times article last summer entitled “The 11 Best Foods You Aren’t Eating.” Beets headlined the list.

I guess he also missed the hilarious “Battle of the Beets” episode of Iron Chef between Chef Morimoto and Chicago chef Homaro Cantu, when beets were the “secret ingredient” and ended up in sushi rolls, ice cream, a soufflé, a salad with mascarpone, and chocolate pudding.

The White House chef, Cristeta Comerford, can rectify this situation easily by turning to the nation’s food blogs which give beets of all colors the credit they deserve.

At Simply Recipes, Elise Bauer does a chunky, well-seasoned Borscht (beet soup) that’s the quintessential one-dish winter meal. Cooked slowly with a meaty beef shank and topped with a dollop of sour cream and wisps of fresh dill, it offers layers of flavor and an irresistible aroma. It also contains plenty of cabbage, another veggie touted in the NYT’s article about “Best Foods.”

When I grew up in Boston quite a few decades ago, pickled beets were synonymous with beet salad. (I was lucky to have beets from my Grandpa’s backyard garden; most Americans thought that all pickled beets came from cans.) But today’s fresh beet salads are glamorous affairs incorporating goat cheese or blue; toasted walnuts or pumpkin seeds; spinach, mache or endive; orange zest, mandarin segments, figs and feta.

WednesdayChef’s adaptation of the Beet Salad with Horseradish and Fried Capers from food writer/editor Amanda Hesser uses horseradish to enhance the beets’ flavor and fried capers to add an inviting crunch.

On my own blog, MaureenClancy.com, I recently shared my favorite (next to my Grandpa’s, of course) beet salad, an elegant creation by Jody Adams of Rialto Restaurant in Cambridge, MA. In it, fresh spinach plays the “green” role, fresh figs transform the texture, and toasted anise seed and orange zest add sparkle.

At FoodMayhem, beets anchor a salad that’s dressed up with honeyed walnuts, goat cheese and mandarin orange slices. The recipe is especially valuable for its directions on how to cook beets in a microwave.

Beets ARE messy, no doubt about it. And they ARE a pain to peel. (Always cook first, either in boiling water, in the oven or in the microwave; then peel while still barely warm. Wear disposable plastic gloves unless you’re itching to trade that taupe-y polish color for a lurid shade of pink.) Today, many supermarkets carry pre-cooked beets that are shrink-wrapped and will keep in the refrigerator for a month or two.

Armed with that convenience product, it’s a snap to whip up the Beet and Pear Puree from AllRecipes. Rounded out with a bit of sweet onion and a few splashes of tangy cranberry vinegar (I used Pomegranate Champagne vinegar from California Harvest), it’s the perfect accompaniment to braised pork tenderloin and roasted turkey breast.

Ditto, the Roasted Beets with Garlic-Beet Puree from Epicurious which whips cooked beets and potatoes together with lots of roasted garlic and a bit of balsamic vinegar, then folds a few wedges of beets into the creamy mixture. Nothing brightens up a plate of grilled chicken breasts faster.

For folks who shy away from pureed creations - I have friends who equate puree with baby food and steer clear of it - Epicurious also tempts with simple roasted beets dressed in a Moroccan “caftan” of toasted, crushed cumin seeds, lemon juice and a flurry of fresh mint.

Versatile beets are also at home in pasta and risotto dishes. On AlDente.com, KitchenMaus takes a classic beet risotto from CookingWithAmy and gussies it up with tangerine oil and frizzled beets.

Michael Romano, chef at Union Square Cafe in New York City plays around with beets and other root vegetables a lot. I’m so crazy about his Penne with Gorgonzola, Beets, and Toasted Walnuts that I featured it recently on MaureenClancy.com and made it at home twice in one week, experimenting with both plain and whole wheat pasta. (Sometimes whole wheat pasta overwhelms the other ingredients in a dish, but beets marry well with the pasta’s assertive flavor.)

One of the yummiest riffs on beets that I’ve found in the blogosphere is the Beet-Feta Tart from Molly Wizenberg on Orangette. Molly says she encountered the tart at a “loosely aphrodisiac-themed dinner party” and goes on to describe the buttery tour-de-force:

“The tart looked like a sheet of hot-pink satin overlaid with off-white lace, and it was blush-inducingly delicious. It brought together the dark, earthy flavor of beets-sweet and rich, with a welcome bitter edge-and the salty tang of feta, binding them in a smooth, eggy custard.”

C’mon, President Obama. You’re not really going to pass that up, are you?

And last, but certainly not least, there’s the beet as the darling of the dessert tray. The Dark Chocolate and Beet Brownie at LaTartineGourmande is a deep, dark, satisfying creation. And, like carrot cake, it allows the eater to claim a couple extra servings of vegetables for the day!

At CookAndEat.com, the recipe for Beet Mash Chocolate Cake with Beet Frosting and Dark Chocolate Beet Ganache is cleverly entitled “Be Still My Beeting Heart.” Adapted from the cookbook David’s Dinners, by David Lieberman, it’s a guaranteed success at any Valentine’s Day soiree.

Still need more delicious ways to dress and devour the lovely beet, Mr. President? You can find over 20,250 delectible beet recipes on the FoodieView Recipe Search Engine.

You can find out more about FoodieView contributor, Maureen Clancy, on her blog, Maureenclancy.com.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 16th, 2009 at 11:43 am and is filed under Recipe Roundup. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.