You can cook beets without peel. Delicious, juicy and beautiful: the secrets of quick cooking boiled beets for various dishes

In order for boiled beets to be sweet and juicy, you need to choose the right root crops when buying. A quality vegetable has a small size and a beautiful uniform color.

The skin is thin and tender, without black spots and signs of wilting. The low price, ease of preparation and the possibility of storage make beets a popular product among housewives.

Despite the sweetish taste, beets are low in calories and have a beneficial effect on the digestive tract. It contains fiber and organic acids that promote the absorption of food, as well as:

contains potassium, zinc, magnesium, iodine, iron and various vitamins;
strengthens blood vessels and reduces pressure, supports hematopoiesis;
It has a positive effect on the work of muscles, including the heart.

In general, it has a rejuvenating and firming effect, with minimal contraindications. Fresh green tops are very useful. In the summer, it is added to beetroot soup or botvinia soup.

How long to cook fresh beets

Cooking time is determined not only by the size of the root crop. It is also important whether he is young or old, and how long ago the crop was harvested. The use of modern kitchen appliances makes its own adjustments.

Until ready

Since beets can cook from 20 minutes to 3 hours, it is problematic to determine their readiness by a timer.

It is better to do this by hand, piercing the vegetable with a knife or fork and judging its softness.

Even with a long cooking time, most of the vitamins will be preserved.

young

Young beets are a seasonal commodity. It appears on the shelves in the middle of summer and is distinguished by the presence of green tops. These vegetables are very tender and delicate in taste. After boiling, it is enough to cook them for about 20 minutes. Then the hot tubers are poured with ice water and left to cool.

Fresh

Freshly plucked beets from the garden cook faster than old ones. During storage, the peel becomes thicker, and the core hardens and slightly dehydrates. The specific cooking time is determined in this case by the size of the vegetable.

Large

A large beetroot tastes almost the same as a smaller one. But it takes a long time to cook it, and for this the housewives do not like such specimens. Putting the vegetable in the pan, you need to tune in for at least a two-hour wait. Especially hard root crops can be cooked for a full three hours.

Without peel

Sometimes beets are pre-cleaned, although this is generally not recommended. Peeled beets cook a little faster. Medium-sized copies will be ready in 30-40 minutes. After prolonged boiling, a vegetable without a peel will acquire a brown hue. To avoid this, add vinegar or lemon juice to the water.

grated

When you need grated beets, it is better to cook them whole, and then grate them. If you grind it raw and then stew, then both the bright color and most of the vitamins will disappear. But this method has one indisputable advantage - the grated vegetable will quickly become soft and ready to eat.

in the soup

Beets for borscht are boiled separately, and then added to the pan before the end of cooking. But sometimes finely chopped cubes are added directly to the vegetable soup, where they will be ready in 10 minutes. To prevent the initially bright vegetable from becoming completely pale, the soup is acidified with lemon juice.

How to cook beets quickly

Before you start cooking root crops, they are thoroughly washed from the ground. It is not necessary to cut off the top and bottom of the tubers, you can only shorten the tail. It is also not recommended to trim damaged areas. This can be done later by peeling the boiled vegetable.

Classic way

The usual and familiar way of cooking beets is in a saucepan on the stove. Vegetables are placed in a bowl and filled with water so that it generously covers them. During long cooking, some of the water will boil away.

To reduce the evaporation of the liquid, cover the pan with a lid.

Bring the water to a boil at the highest temperature.
Then the fire is reduced to a minimum.
At a slow boil, vegetables are cooked for an hour or two, depending on the size.
When the tubers are easily pierced with a knife, the pan is removed from the stove and placed under an ice stream.

In cold water, the beets remain until completely cooled. Now it can be peeled and used in a salad or as a side dish.

How to speed up cooking

To make the beets cook faster, you can throw them into already boiling water and cook at a rapid boil without lowering the heat. An easy way to further increase the temperature of the water is to pour a couple of tablespoons of vegetable oil into the pan, which will create a film on the surface. This preparation will take approximately one hour.

If time is very short, vegetables can be pre-peeled and cut into pieces. This will worsen the taste and appearance, but will reduce the cooking time to 20 minutes.

Young beets are prepared by a quick shock method: they are boiled for about half an hour and immediately poured with ice water. A sharp temperature drop brings the root crop to readiness. The whole process takes 40-50 minutes.

Different cooking methods

In an effort to diversify the taste of vegetables and quickly cook dinner, housewives use modern kitchen appliances. For example, roasting will give the beets a firmer texture and a sweeter taste.

in a saucepan

The traditional and easiest way to cook beetroot is to boil it in a saucepan. It is only necessary not to forget about root crops boiling for a long time on the stove. This process is always finished by immersing the vegetables in cold water. So they will not only reach perfect condition, but will also be better cleaned.

in the microwave

Salad recipes often feature baked beets. You can cook it in the microwave, it will take about 30 minutes. If the microwave does not have a lot of power and you want to speed up the process, put the beets in a plastic sleeve for baking. It will taste like boiled, but sweeter.

In a slow cooker

Cooking beets in a slow cooker is very simple. It must be washed cleanly, put in a bowl and turn on the “Extinguishing” or “Cooking” mode for one hour.

Readiness can be checked by piercing the vegetable with a fork, and if necessary, start the slow cooker in the same mode for another half hour.

Some wrap each root vegetable in foil and cook in the "Baking" mode.

In a double boiler

To steam beets, you will need a double boiler or slow cooker with a steam function. Whole vegetables are laid out on a wire rack, a glass of water is poured into the bottom of the bowl. After 40-50 minutes, check if the dish is ready. In this way, juicy beets work well.

If the roots are wilted, they can be soaked in cold water in advance or cooked on the stove in the usual way.

In a pressure cooker

It takes about 35 minutes to cook whole beets in a pressure cooker. You can pre-peel the vegetables and cut into strips. So they will cook faster, in 20 minutes.

The video provides instructions and some tips for cooking beets in the microwave.

Storage rules

If raw beetroot perfectly tolerates long-term storage, then when boiled, it loses this useful quality to a large extent.

At room temperature, the cooked vegetable should be consumed within a few hours.
Peeled beets will lie in the refrigerator for 1-2 days.
A whole vegetable in the skin and without cuts can be stored in the cold for a little longer, but usually after three days of storage it begins to lose its taste and health benefits.

At the same time, both fresh and boiled beets can be frozen in sliced form. The shelf life in the freezer is much longer. Once defrosted, vegetables must be used; they cannot be re-frozen.

No doubt, everyone can cook beets. But in any case, questions arise that only experience can answer.

Cool down.

In all cases, without exception, immediately after cooking, it is recommended to put the beets under a stream of ice water. A cold shower not only cools the root crops, but brings them to the best degree of readiness and makes it easy to peel.

Do not salt.

The water in which the beets are boiled does not need to be salted. Salt makes vegetables firmer and longer cooking times. Ready beets will be tough and less juicy. Its specific sweetish taste does not require additives during cooking.

Do not clean.

Before cooking, beets are not cleaned and the top and tail are not cut off. Natural intact peel perfectly preserves healthy juice and rich burgundy color inside the root crop. Trimmed or peeled beets will turn whitish and watery and also lose some of their sweetness.

How to get rid of the smell.

When the beets are cooked for a long time, a not very pleasant smell arises in the kitchen. To neutralize it, it is advised to put a crust of bread in a pan with vegetables. And some housewives put beets in a plastic bag, and then in a pot of water.

How to check readiness.

Since one beet boils quickly, and the other much longer, readiness is checked by piercing the root crop with something. For this purpose, a knife, fork or even a toothpick is suitable. If the tip of the object easily and smoothly enters the pulp, the vegetable is ready. If not, wait another half an hour.

Don't poke the beets too often, as a lot of juice will come out of them.

Boiled beetroot not only decorates the table due to its wonderful color. It brings great benefits to the body, supplying it with the necessary vitamins and minerals. With very little effort, we get a great product that is suitable for salad, soup or a healthy snack. From the broth left after cooking, you can make a delicious healing drink by adding lemon juice, cinnamon and ginger to it.

It would seem that among all the culinary tricks and secrets, cooking vegetables does not require any special knowledge and is subject even to completely ignorant, novice housewives. Not everything, however, is so simple, for example, how to cook beets for a vinaigrette or bright, with a rich, flawless color, borscht or a characteristic beetroot? So that the proper crunch is present, both elasticity and vitamins are preserved.

If beets should be boiled for cooking on its basis or as an additional ingredient in a salad: a traditional vinaigrette, with apples, with garlic and sauce, with herbs and aromatic olive oil, for everyone’s favorite herring under a fur coat, etc., you need to get a bright vegetable , a certain hardness. Hard enough (vinaigrette) or, on the contrary, soft (fur coat). The most common typical mistakes when cooking beets are stiffness, heterogeneity of structure, and pallor. Then how to cook beets correctly in order to avoid them? Should:

Water should slightly cover the vegetables, at the same time you need to monitor the water level, and periodically add cold water, since the vegetables must always be completely in the water.

When boiling several root vegetables, they should be approximately the same shape and weight.

Beet tails cannot be trimmed.

It is preferable to select undamaged root crops, clean them well before cooking from contamination, rinse.

The most optimal form of beets for cooking whole (not for soups) is cylindrical, elongated, rich red, sweet.

Cook should be on low heat, avoid boiling, under the lid.

You can check the softness and readiness traditionally - with a knife, a toothpick (pierce). As a rule, the beets are definitely ready, if the root crop slides off the knife on its own, it is not necessary to shake it. Just don't do it every four minutes. Ideally, check the readiness once. Otherwise, the root crop will be completely exhausted, the juice will flow out, the brightness and integrity will be lost. You should calmly, without disturbing, cook the beets for 40 minutes, after which you can check for readiness if the fruits are small or a slightly harsh, crispy structure is required.

Salting water for cooking beets is not worth it, firstly, it is practically useless, and secondly, it can somewhat affect the taste of the vegetable.

Often there is a need to preserve color, how to cook bright and beautiful beets? To preserve the color, boiled water can be acidified or sweetened. Add a couple of tablespoons of table vinegar or lemon juice, or sugar per 3 liters of one liquid (excluding the volume of vegetables). Citric acid or sour kvass is also suitable.

There are no strict requirements for the material of the dishes, however, it should be understood that the decoction turns out to be coloring and saturated. However, it is not recommended to cook in metal utensils. There are requirements for the size, the smaller the useless volume of the container, the better. Ideally, a couple of cm should remain from the surface of the liquid to the lid.

When cooking beets, there is a somewhat specific smell, it is easy to get rid of it by putting a bread crust in the pan.

In order for the finished beets to be easily and quickly cleaned, after cooking, rinse them or dip them for 8-10 minutes in cold water. The vegetable is cooked separately from the rest, and the sliced prepared beet slices / cubes are smeared with any vegetable oil in order to preserve the color and not stain the rest of the salad ingredients.

If you want to cook beets very quickly, you can also boil chopped peeled root vegetables. fast? The main thing is a minimum of water, a small container, a closed lid. Enough 15 minutes. After boiling, you should definitely add a spoonful of vinegar and mix - the color will be restored. For salads, beets can also be boiled / baked, stewed, baked in a conventional oven.

Beetroot, or beetroot, as it is called in the common people, serves as a good basis for soups, is used as a side dish, adds flavor and color to elegant salads. In order for the expectations to be met and the beetroot dish to turn out to be appetizing, you need to know a few subtleties, how to cook it correctly and how long it will take.

How to choose a good beetroot

If the vegetables are to be cooked whole, they should be about the same size. Then they will be completely ready at the same time and will not disappoint with a raw middle.

If possible, it is better to check the thickness of the skin. In juicy and ripe fruits, it is tender and thin. Root crops should be dry, dark, without splashes of green.

Wrinkled, sluggish beetroot should not be used either raw or boiled for vinaigrette or any other dish.

Cooking beets in a vinaigrette pot

Vinaigrette is the most popular dish in which boiled beetroot is used. Traditionally, it is boiled in a pot. Not knowing how long this will take, you can spoil the color and taste of the root crop and, accordingly, the future dish.

For vinaigrette, it is better to choose medium-sized beets. They need to be washed well under running water and put in a saucepan. The bowl should be large enough to completely cover the vegetables with water. Approximate cooking time:

large beetroots - about 2 hours
medium - about 1.5 hours
small fruits - 1 hour is enough

The readiness of the product is easily checked with a knife, which should freely pierce the entire root crop. To make the vinaigrette a bright saturated color, experienced housewives add table vinegar to the water at the rate of 1 teaspoon per 1 liter of water.

Advice! Beets have to be boiled in the same bowl, as the walls of the pan acquire a characteristic coating that is difficult to clean. Beetroot can be placed in a bag, tied well and lowered into water. After cooking, the bag with root crops must be poured with cold water to cool. The pan will always be clean!

The subtleties of cooking beets in different kitchen appliances

The abundance of kitchen appliances sometimes leads to confusion, how many hours or minutes it takes to cook vegetables in them. There are different options that you can take into service:

- In a pressure cooker, beetroot can be boiled whole or cut into strips. How much does it need to cook in different versions? Whole root vegetables will cook for 30 to 40 minutes. It all depends on the size. Sliced into strips - only 20 minutes.

To get a boiled product from the microwave, the fruits need to be washed well, made multiple punctures with a knitting needle and set to maximum power. After 10 minutes, the beets will be completely ready.

In a double boiler, whole beets need to be cooked for about 50 minutes. Cooking time can be reduced to half an hour if the washed and peeled root crop is cut into strips.

And if there is a slow cooker available, how much beets should be boiled in it? Medium-sized root vegetables will be ready in 40 minutes, large ones in an hour, and diced ones in literally 15 minutes. In all cases, the “Baking” mode is set on the multicooker.

On a note! With any cooking method, you also need to know how much water is needed so that the beets boil evenly. It should completely cover the roots during the entire cooking time. During the boil, the water evaporates rapidly, so it will have to be added regularly until the vegetables are completely cooked.

- Properly boil fruits in unsalted water. There are several reasons for this. Salt water hardens the product. If you add salt to the water during cooking, the salt will evaporate anyway and will not be felt. This is due to the sweetness of the root itself. That is why vegetables are salted already in the finished dish.

Beetroots are always laid in cold water. This contributes to the preservation of the maximum amount of vitamins.

The finished product should be pulled out of boiling water and doused with ice water. This will make it easier to remove the skin.

In order for the beetroot to retain its color during cooking, you can add not only vinegar, but also lemon juice to the water.

No matter how much the beets are cooked, the musty smell in the kitchen will be annoying. To avoid this problem, you can add a crust of rye bread to a container of boiling water and root vegetables.

A decoction of beetroot is used for cooking first courses, as well as a diuretic.

If there are no contraindications for eating beetroot, then it can be used in the diet menu for weight loss. Its energy value is only 44 kcal per 100 grams of the product. Bright fruits are also suitable for making baby puree. Beets, rich in vitamins and microelements, can be safely included in the daily diet for the whole family.

Beets have been known all over the world for a long time, and at first only tops were eaten. Today, along with the root crop, it allows you to enrich the body with vitamins, iodine, and iron. However, you can save all the benefits and taste of a vegetable only by preparing it correctly.

Features of vegetable culture

Beet is an annual, rarely biennial plant of the amaranth family. Both the ripening root crop of a burgundy-red hue and young green leaves with a reddish border along wavy edges are used for food.

There are 3 main types of crops - table, sugar and fodder. They eat canteen, which can be of several varieties. For cooking or baking, many people prefer to use the Bordeaux variety, which is characterized by medium, slightly flattened roots of a rich burgundy hue.

The vegetable contains tocopherol (vitamin E), B vitamins, vitamin P and PP, as well as iodine, iron and zinc. Beets are low-calorie vegetables, the nutritional value per 100 g is 40 kcal. The main part of the composition falls on water and carbohydrates, proteins and fats are presented in small quantities. In addition to carbohydrates, beets are also high in sugars, fructose and glucose.

The high content of iron, as well as a substance called betaine (it is this that causes the bright shade of the vegetable), has a beneficial effect on the circulatory and vascular systems. Beet helps to increase the level of hemoglobin, which, in turn, improves the nutrition of organs and tissues. Betaine in combination with vitamin P makes the vascular walls stronger and more elastic, improves the absorption of vitamin B.

This vegetable is especially useful for people suffering from anemia, it is the prevention of the development of atherosclerosis, varicose veins, heart attack. Possessing the ability to increase pressure, the root crop helps hypertensive patients to normalize and stabilize pressure.

Due to the antioxidant properties of beets, it is recommended for liver diseases, helps to eliminate toxins and toxins from the body. The bactericidal effect of the root crop makes its use effective in the treatment of external injuries, long-healing wounds, and abrasions. Taking beetroot juice orally is one of the measures to treat gastritis and ulcers.

Possessing dietary fiber, beets stimulate intestinal motility, improving digestion, accelerating metabolism. It has been proven that regular consumption of this vegetable is one of the preventive measures against bowel cancer.

With caution, you should eat beets for diabetes, hypotension, gastritis and ulcers, characterized by low acidity, for osteoporosis, diarrhea and urolithiasis.

How to choose a root crop?

For cooking, you should choose young soft root crops, then the finished dish will turn out to be softer, more tender. It is better not to use too large root crops, they will be dry and fibrous. Too large an acquired vegetable may well turn out to be fodder, and not table. The best option is medium beets with a red-burgundy thin skin without signs of damage and decay.

If possible, buy beets with tops. The latter will help to understand how fresh and young the root crop is, and in addition, fresh tops can also be used in cooking.

How long to cook?

The cooking time of the root crop depends on its size and cooking method. Small root vegetables are boiled for 40-60 minutes, and if cut into pieces - no more than half an hour. However, in the latter case, they can lose color, and at the same time become tasteless.

The larger the root crop, the longer it takes to cook. Small ones are cooked for about 50 minutes, medium ones - an hour and a half, large ones - up to two or more hours. The time is indicated for cooking the root crop as a whole, when cutting it into pieces, the cooking time is reduced, but its beneficial properties practically disappear.

An important point: the cooking time should be counted from the moment of boiling. The fire should be moderate, although it is allowed to make it maximum until the water boils.

Traditionally, beets are boiled in water, which takes about an hour. You can shorten this process to 20-30 minutes, but, unfortunately, to the detriment of the usefulness of the vegetable, it will lose ascorbic acid.

The root crop is baked a little faster - about 40 minutes for medium beets. However, even with this method, vitamin C and some others are destroyed.

To reduce the cooking time, some "helpers" in the kitchen - a microwave oven and a pressure cooker - allow. The first allows you to cook a vegetable as quickly as possible - in 8-20 minutes. In a pressure cooker, beets are cooked for 8-10 minutes, but the device cannot be opened immediately after the specified time. You should wait another 10 minutes, which increases the total cooking time.

Cooking in a slow cooker in time is not much different from the same process on the stove or in the oven. In a bowl of water, beets are boiled for at least an hour, for a couple - a little less (50-60 minutes), in baking mode, as in an oven - 50-60 minutes.

You can find out about the readiness of the root crop using a fork or a toothpick. Fully boiled or baked, it will pierce well. However, you should not check the vegetable too often - from numerous punctures it becomes colorless and tasteless.

When cooking in a saucepan, cover it with a lid. This will reduce the cooking time and reduce the loss of useful components. In addition, the characteristic odor will spread indoors to a lesser extent. Another method to shorten the cooking time is to add butter to the boiling water. It will take a little - 2-3 tablespoons.

Ways

Preparing the root crop for cooking involves washing it thoroughly. But it is not recommended to clean the root crop in its raw form, it will lose its bright shade. If the beets are still peeled, a tablespoon of vinegar or lemon juice added to the water during cooking will help maintain its intense color. By the way, the same method can also be used if you need to preserve the shade of an unpeeled root crop.

There are several ways to cook beets, differing in cooking time, technology, inventory and equipment used. One of the simplest is traditional cooking in a saucepan over a fire. However, there are several options here as well.

Beets should be washed, put in a large pot or cast iron, pour cold water so that it completely hides the vegetable, and put on maximum heat. As soon as the water boils, the intensity of the fire should be reduced and the root crop should be left to languish for 2-3 hours.

This method takes a lot of time, but allows you to almost completely preserve the beneficial components of the beets.

The next method is similar to the first, but you need to pour the vegetable with boiling water, to which 2-3 tablespoons of vegetable oil are added. In this case, the cooking time will be reduced to 60 minutes.

The third cooking method is usually used by professional chefs. It involves boiling the root crop over high heat with the addition of vegetable oil (a couple of spoons) for half an hour. After the specified time, the vegetable is taken out of boiling water, poured with ice water and left in it for 10 minutes. With this method, beets cook the fastest, but vitamin C from its composition is completely lost.

You can use a microwave oven to roast beets. First you need to wash it, dry it slightly and wrap it in baking paper. The cooking time will be 35-40 minutes with a unit power of at least 800 watts.

In a similar way, you can bake the root crop in the oven, setting the temperature in it to 200 degrees. Contrary to popular belief, beets completely lose vitamin C when baked.

Roasting beets makes them sweeter, so this option is usually used for salads.

The microwave oven allows you to cook beets in another way, while taking this record-breaking short amount of time. With a device power of 1000 W or more, it takes 8-10 minutes to cook medium-sized beets. If a less powerful microwave is used, the time is doubled.

Washed beets should be put in a glass dish. Larger vegetables - in the middle, small ones - at the edges. Pour 3-4 tablespoons of water into a plate, it should be at the bottom of the dish. Then put the bowl in the microwave, closing it with a glass or special microwave lid.

Instead of a plate and lid, you can use a plastic bag, tightly tying it. When the root crop is cooked, it must be removed from the oven and left to cool at room conditions. It will taste the same as cooked in a saucepan over a fire.

You can cook beets in a slow cooker for a couple. The prepared root crop must be put in a special container for steaming, and filled with water into the bowl. Install the unit, close it with a lid and turn on the steam cooking mode.

As a rule, most programs in this mode automatically set the cooking time to 40 minutes. It will be enough, although the exact time depends on the model of the multicooker. After the specified time, you should check the readiness of the beets, if necessary, hold over the steam a little more. In this case, be sure to make sure that there is enough water in the bowl.

With the help of a slow cooker, you can cook beets in the classic way - in water. However, using a slow cooker offers several advantages - there is no need to adjust the intensity of the fire and there is no risk that the water will “run away”, flooding the stove.

So, for cooking in a slow cooker, the root crop should be washed, you can shorten the tail a little. Put it in a bowl, add cold water to the maximum mark and set the “Cooking”, “Stew” or “Soup” mode. The duration of the process is an hour. After a while, you should check the root crop, if necessary, put it to cook for another 10-30 minutes.

Young vegetables with a high moisture content and juices are best baked. If you have a multicooker, this can be done right in it. The prepared root crop must be placed in foil, previously lubricated with vegetable oil. If you are baking several vegetables at the same time, then each must be wrapped separately. In this form, the root crop is placed in the multicooker bowl and cooked in the baking mode for 60 minutes.

A pressure cooker will also prove useful for cooking vegetables. It needs to be washed, cleaned with a brush and laid on the bottom of the pressure cooker, add water and set the “Cooking” mode. For medium-sized root crops, 10 minutes is enough, for those that are larger - 15 minutes. After the specified time, the beets should be kept in the pressure cooker for another 10 minutes so that the pressure drops and the unit can be opened.

If a double boiler is used to cook the root crop, it will take about half an hour. After washing, it is lowered into the unit, water is poured into a special compartment and a timer is set.

The following methods allow you to get delicious boiled beets and quickly prepare them for further use:

You need to finish cooking with cold water, which will then allow you to quickly remove the skin from the root crop.
When cooking beets, you need to control the water level - it should completely cover the vegetable. Add hot or boiling liquid as needed.
The vegetable does not require the addition of salt during cooking, moreover, salting makes the root crop hard and causes an increase in its cooking time.
If you do not like the smell that appears when boiling beets, you can get rid of it by throwing a bread crust into the water while boiling.
If you are cutting beetroot into a vinaigrette, drizzle the cut pieces with vegetable oil. Due to this, other components of the dish will not be stained.

Prolonged contact of the peeled vegetable with air should not be allowed, this will cause the destruction of vitamin C in its composition.
The decoction remaining after boiling the root crop is used as a delicate laxative and diuretic. To improve the taste, you can add lemon juice, ginger and cinnamon to it.
Young beet tops contain 2-2.5 times more vitamins than the vegetable itself. It should be added to salads, cook cabbage soup with beet tops.
The shelf life of boiled vegetables is 2 days in the refrigerator. On the third day, it begins to dry out, lose its useful components, and its use in food is not recommended.

What to cook from boiled vegetables?

Beetroot

3-4 medium-sized boiled beets;
3-4 potatoes;
1.5 l of broth;
2 tablespoons of table vinegar;
salt, black pepper, herbs, spices - to taste.

Peel and grate the boiled beets on a medium grater, then stew in a pan with the addition of vinegar for 3-4 minutes. Put the broth on the fire, bring to a boil and throw in the peeled and diced potatoes. Boil it for 5-7 minutes, then add beets, salt, spices, herbs. Cook until boiling and then a couple more minutes.

Serve beetroot soup with sour cream.

beetroot sauce

To prepare the dish you need:

4 beets baked in the oven;
3-4 cloves of garlic;
3 cm piece of fresh ginger;
thyme leaves;
150 ml cream;
vegetable oil for frying.

Peel all ingredients and pass through a meat grinder. Pour vegetable oil into a frying pan, warm it up a little and put thyme leaves. After they give their flavor to the oil, remove them from the pan. Pour in the cream and bring to a boil, then add the spicy beet mass. Mix everything thoroughly, bring to a boil again and then simmer for another 7-10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Beets for garnish

For cooking you need:

boiled beets;
2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar and vegetable (olive) oil;
a pinch (at the tip of a knife) of dried marjoram;
salt and black ground pepper to taste.

Peel the boiled beets and cut into slices or cubes. Pour over the oil-vinegar mixture, salt and pepper, and lastly sprinkle with marjoram.

Classic vinaigrette

For cooking you need:

1-2 small boiled beets;
1-2 carrots;
2 pickles;
150 g fresh or pickled sauerkraut;
1 onion;
salt pepper;
2-3 tablespoons of vegetable oil.

Wash the beets, carrots and potatoes, brush off the dried earth with a brush and boil until tender. Cool and peel, then cut into small cubes.

Peel the onion and chop finely. Cut the cucumbers into cubes, chop the cabbage and knead a little with your hands. Mix all the ingredients, salt, pepper, season with oil.

Roasted vegetable vinaigrette

To prepare the dish you need:

2 beets;
4 potatoes;
2 carrots;
a can of canned peas;
2 teaspoons of mustard;
3 cloves of garlic;
1 onion;
5 tablespoons of olive (can be replaced with vegetable) oil;
2 teaspoons of wine vinegar;
1 teaspoon of honey;
salt pepper.

Peel potatoes with carrots, cut into cubes and bake on a greased baking sheet until tender. Beets are also sent to the oven, after washing and wrapping in foil. Please note that carrots and potatoes will need to be taken out of the oven much earlier than beets. On average, they take 15-17 minutes to bake.

While the vegetables are cooking, you can make the dressing. To do this, mix honey, oil and mustard, add crushed or finely grated garlic, salt and pepper. Cut the onion into rings, half rings or quarters and marinate in vinegar for a quarter of an hour.

Put the prepared carrots and potatoes in a salad bowl, add the baked and peeled, sliced beets, pickled onions and green peas to them. Pour in the resulting dressing.

Herring under a fur coat

Ingredients:

1 fat slightly salted herring;
3 potatoes;
2 medium beets, pre-boiled;
2 carrots;
1 onion;
egg yolks to decorate the salad;
mayonnaise.

First of all, you need to boil the washed potatoes and carrots. At this time, you can take up the fish - divide it in half, remove the bones and skin, finely chop the resulting fillet.

At the bottom of the plate you need to lay out pieces of fish and cover them with a layer of chopped onions. It is recommended to pre-soak it in water for 5 minutes. Put mayonnaise on top of the onion and spread it. You should get a thin mayonnaise layer.

Cool the boiled potatoes, peel and cut into cubes. Put them on top of the previous layer, on top - a mayonnaise mesh. You can make it by pouring mayonnaise into a confectionery syringe, and in the absence of one, into a regular plastic bag with a corner cut off. The mesh does not need to be smeared.

Peel the boiled carrots, grate and lay on top of the mesh on the salad, do the same on the carrot layer. The last layer will be peeled and grated beets, which are completely covered with mayonnaise. Egg yolks are usually used for decoration. You can supplement them with greens, roses rolled from strips of carrots or beets. Iwashi can be used instead of herring.

Beets are a unique vegetable, without which it is impossible to imagine Slavic cuisine. It is part of many favorite dishes - such as borscht, vinaigrette, beetroot, herring under a fur coat and various salads. Therefore, many are interested in how to properly, and most importantly, quickly cook beets, and it would be nice to keep all the vitamins that this vegetable is so rich in.

How to choose the right beets for cooking

In order to get a tasty and healthy beetroot dish, you need to choose young root crops: they are softer and tastier. The selected root crop should be medium in size, dense, with a thin skin of a dark red color, without signs of damage and rot.

We put aside very large root crops - perhaps this is not table beet at all, but fodder.

In principle, fodder varieties can also be eaten, but besides the fact that they will not be so sweet, the chemical composition of the fertilizers that the plants were treated with during growth is a little alarming. It must be remembered that the composition of fertilizers for food and forage crops is different, so it is better not to risk it.

Bordeaux is considered the best.- small flattened roots of bright burgundy color with a thin skin.

If you have an ability buy beets with tops, it's just great. Greens will indicate to you the freshness of the root crop, in addition, the tops themselves are very useful and you can cook several very tasty dishes from it.

How to cook beetroot

This question is of interest not only to amateurs in cooking - after all, it must be cooked so that it retains the maximum of useful substances. There are several ways to cook beets quickly and tasty.

1 way

This recipe will take a lot of time, but it will allow you to save all the vitamins that beets are so rich in.

The root crop is completely poured with cold water and put on the stove, setting the maximum temperature. After boiling, the temperature is reduced, and beets are cooked over moderate heat for another 2-3 hours- depending on the size.

2 way

The cooking process can be shortened up to one hour, if you pour beets with boiling water. To make the water temperature even higher, add three to four tablespoons of vegetable oil to it.

3 way

This method is used by professional chefs. The beets are boiled at the maximum temperature with the addition of vegetable oil to the water for about 20–30 minutes, depending on the size, then removed from the stove and poured with cold water for another 10 minutes. A sharp temperature drop will bring the root crop to full readiness. The only negative is that vitamin C is completely destroyed during such processing.

4 way

This method can not be called fast, but it will turn out very tasty. Beets are wrapped in baking paper and set in the microwave for 25-30 minutes.

You can wrap the vegetable in foil and bake it in the oven at a temperature of 200 degrees. But vitamin C with this method, unfortunately, will not be preserved either - it is destroyed already at 190 degrees.

Baked beets always turn out to be sweeter than boiled ones, so this method is good if the vegetable is later used to make salads.

Secrets of cooking beets

The cooking process should always be completed with cold water - this will make it easier to peel the skin.
When cooking beets, it is better not to salt - they will turn out tough and less juicy. Salt also lengthens the cooking time. Moreover, the sweet root crop does not need salt.
Beets are not recommended to be cleaned before cooking - they will lose their rich color. It is better to just wash it thoroughly, and clean it immediately before laying the boiled beets in the dish being prepared.
In order for the vegetable to retain its rich color, 1 teaspoon of vinegar or lemon juice is added to boiling water. This must be done if you nevertheless cleaned the beets before cooking.
Not everyone likes the smell of boiled beets. A crust of bread thrown into boiling water will help neutralize it.
The readiness of the beets is checked with a fork or a wooden toothpick - it should freely enter the root crop. But you don’t need to check readiness all the time: beets pierced in many places will turn out to be less juicy.
If you are going to cook a vinaigrette, then in order for the beets not to color the rest of the ingredients, the chopped pieces of beets are sprinkled with vegetable oil before being added to the salad.
Peeled beets should not be kept in the air for a long time, so as not to destroy vitamin C.
The beetroot decoction left after cooking the beets is an excellent laxative and diuretic. You can add a little lemon juice, cinnamon and ginger to the broth and get a vitamin tonic drink that tastes like kvass.
Beet tops contain a shock dose of vitamins, much larger than in the root crop itself. Add tops to borscht, beetroot soup and other dishes, the recipes of which can be easily found on the Internet. But only young beet tops can go into food - the old one is as tasteless as it is useless.