This beet salad with goat cheese is fresh and full of vibrant flavors. A homemade green goddess dressing ties the whole thing together!
I have never been an eater of beets. My mom loves pickled beets and there’s an ever-present jar of them in my parents’ fridge. To this day, my 37-year-old self has never eaten a pickled beet. It may never happen.
My problem with beets? They smell like dirt. I mean, they grow underground, submerged in the dirt, so on some level it makes sense. However, once I have scrubbed, cooked, and peeled said beets, I don’t want the dirt smell to linger. But it does. Oh yes, yes it does.
That said, I will eat roasted beets. It’s honestly a little odd that I will eat roasted beets but not pickled, because I love pickles. I think it’s just that cold jar of lip-staining red beets soaking in juice that’s so red that it’s almost black that just turns me off.
Here’s the thing about putting things in a salad: if you mix enough great things into a salad, you don’t really notice the individual pieces but rather the sum of the parts. Boy, I am really not selling you guys at the idea of eating beets right now, am I??? Sorry. What I’m getting at is that salads are a great way to start eating beets, or really just about any other form of plant life that you know you should eat (because it’s good for you) and just can’t quite bring yourself to eat.
Honestly, I’ve never loved goat cheese either. Somehow, though, when I mixed beets with goat cheese, greens, and toasted pecans and dressed the whole thing with an amazing green goddess dressing (I borrowed the idea for this salad from Beast + Barrel), everything worked together beautifully. I think I might start eating more beets and goat cheese, whether they’re in this beet salad with goat cheese goat cheese or not.
Mary
Yield: 4 salads
10 minPrep Time:
45 minCook Time:
55 minTotal Time:
Ingredients
- 1 large beet, scrubbed (any color/variety is fine)
- 1/4 cup chopped pecans.
- 1 bag mixed greens
- 1/2 cup green goddess dressing (bottled is fine, but I used Elise Bauer’s recipe from Simply Recipes)
- 2 ounces goat cheese
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Wrap the beet in foil. Place the beet in the oven and roast for about 45 minutes. Allow to cool for a few minutes then peel the beet (the skin should slip away easily when rubbed with a paper towel). Quarter the beets then thinly slice the quarters. Set aside.
- While the beet is roasting, toast the pecans in a dry skillet until lightly browned. Pour into a bowl and set aside.
- Divide the greens among 4 bowls. Drizzle each bowl with two tablespoons of dressing.
- Crumble the goat cheese and sprinkle the goat cheese over the bowls. Sprinkle each salad with a tablespoon of pecans. Divide the beets among the bowls. Serve immediately.
Click here to print the recipe for beet salad with goat cheese!

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