Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets Salad 📺
Beets & Brussels Sprouts in an WFPB creamy oil-free balsamic vinaigrette. A Fall favorite. With video.
Recipe Overview – Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets Salad
🔪 The Recipe: Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets Salad
⏲️ Estimated Time: about 25-30 minutes from scratch.
💵 Cost to make: $1.74 USD / $2.71 CAD
🍽️ Servings: Around 1-2 servings
🕹️ Difficulty: Easy
The Menu
This sweet fall and winter salad takes fresh pungent Brussels sprouts and candy and coats them in a vibrant red sugar from the beets. Poached beets sit a top of a lentil feta and a pile of seasonal greens.
All drizzled with a sweet, tangy, and creamy Balsamic vinaigrette.
Each bite begins with the crunch of seasonal greens followed by the bright zip and tang of lentil feta as the spices give a slight nod to the Mediterranean. The bitterness and firm bite of a Brussels sprout quickly, and pleasantly, turns to sweet and tender as it melts in your mouth. Everything plays with the sweetness and tang of the creamy Balsamic dressing that gently grazes each leaf of this wonderful seasonal dish.
Still Coming Soon: WFPB Broccoli Cheddar Soup (📺)
Also, still stay tuned for this week’s surprise dessert/snack recipe, coming Friday. If you haven’t already subscribed then do so now so you don’t miss any upcoming recipes!
Why I Had To Make Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beet Salad
I'm not really into salads, personally, which is why I made this salad of substance.
You know when you want a satisfying salad? Nothing light and frilly, but something that really has some substance to it—honestly, that's what I always want in a salad. But since it's "spooky season," the time when there are candy displays and ads everywhere, I decided to sweeten it up with sweet beets and balsamic vinaigrette to counter the bitter Brussels sprouts—I also used radicchio and other bitter greens. My personal favorite is also to add some cubes of tangy lentil feta! Yum!
As for the dressing, I chose my sweet and zippy balsamic vinaigrette which is truly amazing as it is simple! Try it today, it's the perfect salad for Fall or Winter, or as I lovingly refer to it as my fall-into-winter salad.
“When I wanted a salad with substance, this was the perfect answer. It’s easy, quick, and inexpensive to make—as it should be with salads. It does take some time to prepare the candied Brussels and the lentil feta, but oh wow, is it ever worth it! Even without those, the real star of the show is the dressing—just as it should be with salads.
I highly recommend you try it today and enjoy your sweet and savory seasonal fix!”
- Chef Rob (me)
STOP Cooking with Aluminum Foil
While aluminum foil is a common kitchen staple, using it for cooking can pose both culinary and health concerns.
From a culinary perspective we used to think that really high temperatures or only highly acidic, or alkaline foods would cause leaching of aluminum, but new studies have shown that wrapping regular food in aluminum “…foil is not negligible…” and can lead to “…consuming a weekly dose not far from the TWI (tolerable weekly intake).”
In Grandma’s Cabbage Rolls I mentioned how Hot Tap Water is NOT SAFE FOR COOKING and talked a bit about how some autopsies and studies have shown that people with Alzheimer’s tend to have higher amounts of aluminum in their brains than people without.
This review article on aluminum exposure, in the top global 100 most cited articles, goes further saying that “[t]he articles most cited in world literature suggested that aluminum exposure is associated with Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease (PD), dialysis encephalopathy, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, neurodegeneration changes, cognitive impairment, such as bone damage, oxidative alterations, and cytotoxicity.” (There are a lot more studies and a lot more to all of this, so let me know if you want a more substantial article about aluminum exposure).
Moreover, aluminum foil is waste by design and is usually landfill, which also has the potential to leach into groundwater. Instead, consider using alternatives like glass or ceramic cookware and Tupperware, which are all reusable and more sustainable.
The concerns mentioned here all tie back to the concerns I point out in Why You Shouldn’t Use Non-stick cookware, including the leaching of "forever chemicals" and things like Teflon™ Flu and other serious health and environmental risks to us all.
So please reconsider using aluminum foil, for all of our health and safety. If you just can’t give it up yet then avoid cooking highly acidic or alkaline foods in foil, and try to avoid tightly wrapping food and opt for a looser wrap when you can, and try to avoid messy/sticky foods that make it impossible to recycle.
Back to the food…
Full Recipe Video Here
Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets Salad
🧰Equipment
1 Spice / Coffee Grinder
1 Pot
🥣Ingredients
CANDIED BRUSSELS & BEETS
6-8 ea Brussels sprouts
½ cup sliced beets
1 tsp lemon juice
1 cup water add more as needed
BALSAMIC VINAIGRETTE
Dry Ingredients
3 tbsp oats
1 tbsp pumpkin seeds or sunflower seeds
½ tsp onion powder or 1 tsp dehydrated onion
½ tsp mustard seeds (I use half dark and half light but any will work, we just want the lecithin)
1 tsp parsley dried or fresh, of course
Wet Ingredients
4 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
2 tbsp water or more as needed
🔪Instructions - Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets Salad
The full Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets recipe can be found here:
(including step-by-step photos and more detailed instructions and tips.)
Basic Directions
CANDIED BRUSSELS & BEETS
Add beets, lemon juice, water, and Brussels sprouts to a pot on high heat. Bring to a boil then reduce the heat to medium high. Keep cooking the beets are fork tender.
Remove the cooked beets from the pot and keep cooking the Brussels sprouts.
Once all the liquid is cooked off, and the Brussels sprouts are coated in a bright red candy coating, turn off the heat and let cool. Slice each Brussel sprout in half.
BALSAMIC VINAIGRETTE
Add all dry ingredients but the parsley to your spice grinder and blend until it becomes a powder. Add the dry ingredients to a bowl and then add in your wet ingredients.
Finally, add your parsley and mix well. It’s best to dress the bowl or the plate, not the salad! (see point number 3 under protips for why)
Enjoy!
How to Make Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets Salad – Video 📺
Nutrition Facts Table – Candied Brussels & Balsamic Beets Salad
Updates
Under the PlantBasedProof.com/ingredients you will find all of the ingredients I use and research data on which diseases they help to fight—in progress still, but the list is growing each day, here are some of the items in the list: A Plant-Based Life Style Diet, Apple Cider Vinegar, Basil, Beets, Cabbage, Chia Seeds, Dates, Flax Seeds, Garlic, Oats, Onions, Sesame, Spinach, Tahini, Tomatoes, and more to come!
Under the PlantBasedProof.com/research you find science-based research on diseases and diet. Requests are always welcome.
If you’d like to connect on Substack or on other social media then please reach out. I’d love to get to know you more, and I’m always interested in any ideas or opinions you want to share :)
That’s all for today.
Have a day today and stay healthy and nourished!
