Beets are one of those vegetables that has taken me some time to learn to love.  They've got a half sweet, half earthy taste that I just could not wrap my mind around. 

They are however a great veggie for a person on a budget because you can eat all of it.  When buying beets look for the bunch with nice big perky tops.

First separate the bulbs from the leaves.  Scrub off the bulbs and wrap them in foil.  Then roast them in a 375 degree oven until they're knife tender.

The tricky thing about beets is peeling them.  Which is totally necessary because the skins are tough and don't add anything to the beet experience.  BEETS WILL STAIN EVERYTHING THEY TOUCH.  Seriously.  Don't screw around.

I hold the beets in a paper towel while they're still warm and peel of the exterior skin.  It's definitely easier to do this while the beets are still oven-hot.

The great thing about beets is that they're like little bright red sponges that will soak up any flavor you put on them.  As luck would have it I had just finished a jar of cornichons, so I used the leftover, already seasoned, pickling liquid from the jar and added s few chili's and submerged my sliced my beets in the concoction.

My favorite thing to do with beets (outside of risotto, which is awesome, but I don't have the time or energy right now) is beet and goat cheese crostini's.  Really simple and delicious and the perfect thing to munch on while you figure out what's for dinner.

Beet tops are a kinda like a heartier swiss chard, I generally treat them the same way just cook them longer.  Word to the wise: wash your beet greens really well, they can be a tad gritty otherwise.

Chop half an onion and as much garlic as you're comfortable with and cook until tender.  A trick I like to use is to chop the stalk of the beet green and cook that for a few minutes before adding the leafier bits.

Cook until they're tender and add a quick drop of cider vinegar and season with salt and pepper.  Beet greens make a nice side dish when you're in the mood for a meat and two veg kinda evening.

Another great veggie that easily makes two very different dishes.  Speaking as a person who learned to love this veg, it's been worth the added effort to overcome my initial beet anxiety. 

Full credit for this is due to Fergus Henderson and his book The Whole Beast I had never eaten radishes like this, much less eaten their tops before I read his book.  Thanks Mr. Henderson!

First go to your farmers market and buy a bunch of radishes with the tops still attached.  Next, clean your bunch of radishes well with cold running water.  Then simply separate the radish bulbs from the leafy tops.  These are going to make two separate snacks.

The first dish is simple.  Radishes with fresh butter.  Clean the radishes and dry them well with a towel.  Then split them in half (or not) and put a nice dob of room temperature sweet butter on the radish.  If you'd like now is the time to sprinkle with your buttered radish with your best coarse sea salt.

I'm such a product of my Omi, I can't resist a nice blob of beautiful butter without a big piece of baguette.  This plate led me fairly quickly to sliced radishes on buttered bread with salt.  My new favorite snack.

That's snack one, snack two is a radish top salad.  Simply replace your regular greens with the radish tops.  I like to serve this salad with a cider vinegar and mustard vinaigrette with some bits of diced onion.  The radish greens are sharp, and have a unique flavor and texture to boot.  My partner Ross now prefers radish tops to other salad greens.

Keeping the radish bulb end of the green together is an aesthetic choice on my part.  Ross prefers it when I break them up more, but I like the radishiness of the bulb intact.  The choice is up to you.

Of the three vegetables I'm featuring this in the only one you can eat entirely raw.  While the summer season is still here go and get a bunch of radishes, especially while they've still got nice leafy tops.

In the spirit of embracing what's left of summer the next few posts will be about vegetables from my local farmers market.

For the last few months I've been concentrating on the meat aspects of eating nose to tail, but the practice of not wasting anything edible can easily and yummily be applied to a wide variety of vegetables as well.  I've tried to keep this project about how delicious nose to tail eating can be, but minimizing waste when it comes to the food you consume is a great way eat in a responsible (and still tasty) way.

This week I will be focusing on root vegetables.  More specifically beets, radishes and turnips.  I will be eating all of the vegetable from root to leaf, and usually get two remarkably different dishes out of each veggie. 

I'm looking forward to the next few veggie posts, but for those of you here for the meat things will be heading back in that direction shortly.