Vinaigrette salad with baked beetroot

Ingredients for 10 servings:

• 6 beetroot
• 4 potatoes
• 4 carrots
• 2 onions
• 1 can kidney beans
• 5 pickles (sour salt and dill pickles)
• 6 tbsp oil
• Salt and pepper, finely ground

Instructions

Working time approx. 1 hour; Rest time approx. 1 hour; Cooking/baking time approx. 2 hours 30 minutes; Total time approx. 4 hours 30 minutes

spicy and vegan, traditional Ukrainian cuisine

Wrap the beets in aluminum foil, shiny side inward, and bake in the oven at 200 degrees Celsius for about 2-2.5 hours. Check for doneness with a toothpick. Turn off the oven and let the beets cool slowly in the oven overnight so they continue to cook. Boil the potatoes and carrots in lightly salted water until tender, let them cool, and peel. Finely dice the onions or chop them in a food processor. Finely dice the pickles and the cooled vegetables. Place everything in a large bowl. Add the drained kidney beans. Season generously with pepper, a little salt, and toss with oil. Let the salad marinate in the refrigerator for about 1 hour, then season again to taste, adding a finely diced pickle or a little pickle juice if desired. Tip: For vinaigrette salad, it’s important to use sour, salted dill cucumbers and not pickled gherkins, otherwise the salad will taste a bit bland. Baked beets are much more intense in flavor than boiled ones. However, if you’re in a hurry, you can of course use cooked, vacuum-packed beets. Nowadays, vinaigrette salad is sometimes made with peas instead of kidney beans, or with mayonnaise instead of oil—which also tastes delicious. The original recipe for Ukrainian vinaigrette salad, however, dates back to the days when there was no mayonnaise or canned baby peas, so here’s the basic recipe. Along with borscht, vinaigrette salad is one of the oldest and most traditional Ukrainian national dishes, which has now become established in many neighboring countries—which speaks volumes about the dish itself. Vinaigrette salad is also a vegan vitamin bomb and is often prepared during Lent. Beetroot is a “very Ukrainian” vegetable, is grown in every vegetable garden in Ukraine and is widely used in traditional cuisine.