Beet Salad With Skordalia Dressing (Garlic-Potato Puree)
"This is a great 'salad' that may be best served as an appetizer. Crusty bread to accompany (and to spread extra skordalia on)."
- Ready In:
- 50mins
- Ingredients:
- 10
- Serves:
-
6
ingredients
- 15 medium beets, with their greens (or more)
- best quality extra virgin olive oil
- fresh lemon juice
- salt and pepper
- skordalia
- 1 head garlic
- 3⁄4 lb boiled peeled potato
- 2 cups extra virgin olive oil (or more)
- 1⁄3 cup vinegar
- 3⁄4 cup roasted whole almonds (optional) or 3/4 cup roasted walnut, freshly ground (optional)
directions
- Select fresh tender beets and cut off the tops and roots. Wash the beets, without removing the skins, and boil in a large pot with ample water.
- Meanwhile, clean the beet greens with the stems; add to the pot after the beets have cooked 30 minutes. When beets are tender, remove and strain off the liquid.
- Peel the beets and cut them into round slices; chop up the greens. Mound greens in center of a platter and surround them with the beet slices.
- Dress with olive oil, lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste. Serve with the skordalia (the skordalia is served as a 'meze' - in it's own bowl, and dibs and dabs of the skordalia are enjoyed with forkfuls of the beet slices and/or greens). Make sure you have a good quality, artisanal loaf of bread to enjoy with this.
- To make Skordalia: Clean garlic and mash it completely (you may use food processor or blender). Mash in potatoes, one by one, until you have a thick puree. Alternately, add the oil and vinegar, beating constantly getting rid of all lumps (you want it very smooth). Many people like to add almonds or walnuts to skordalia, but this is optional.
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Reviews
-
I made this recipe while participating in 'Recipe Dare', it was my payback recipe. Evelyn's recipe is well written and works out exactly as she states, the Skordalia Dressing ended up smooth and creamy. The beets and their greens were perfectly cooked and very good. I don't feel I'm qualified to give this recipe it's due. The flavor of the dressing is not familiar to us and we couldn't get past the tastes that we're not used to. I'm sure that someone more familiar with Skordalia will be able to review this recipe better than I'm able to. -
There are many steps, but this is rather easy to make. The presentation is attractive and the Skordalia Dressing was out of this world. I will more than likely be using the directions for the Skordalia Dressing to use on other foods. -
Judy, Skordalia is probably unknown to a lot of people. Basically, it's a very thick (consistency of mashed potatoes - and potatoes are a vehicle for this dressing, of course), very garlicky puree. In this salad, the creamy, garlicky skordalia offsets the sweet/tartness of the beets.
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OK, here goes. I live in Athens, Greece. I moved out here many, many years ago from Ottawa, Canada - so I am blessed in having two wonderful heritages!
I suffer from compulsive obsessive behaviour with regard to food and my psychiatrist thought it would be a good idea to find a 'society' where many have the same problem and try to find a cure.
So far, I've copied a couple of thousand recipes from this site and my psychiatrist has thrown the towel in and refuses to answer the phone when I call.
What did I do wrong?
Got 3 kids that keep me on the go - 10 and under at this point (2008) - I may not get round to updating this for a few years, so you'll have to do your own maths.
I teach English full-time and Greek Cookery part-time. I would like to make the cooking part of it full-time and the English Grammar part of it part-time.
That's all for now.
