Beetroot Carpaccio

I read Tom Robbins' Jitterbug Perfume many years ago and became obsessed with beetroot as a culinary ingredient. Like most, I had only eaten tinned beetroot before and I was pleasantly surprised by the flavour of roasted beetroot. I developed two great recipes out of that obsession and this is one of them. Carpaccio is one of my favourite meat dishes. It is so simple and elegant and shows off the meat to its fullest. No less so than with beetroot. Roasted beetroot has deep, rich caramelly flavours which the pepper nero (lemon juice, pepper and olive oil dressing) shows off beautifully. The ginger and coriander are optional, but if you leave them out, then put a small amount of mesculun lettuce on the plate instead for colour and texture contrast. Ingredients Green Grocer

• 2 large beetroot preferably with leaves attached
• 1 lemon
• coriander herb
• fresh ginger

Dry Store

• pepper (freshly ground is best but cracked black pepper will do)
• EVOO (Extra Virgin Olive Oil)

Method

• Cut the stalks off the beetroot leaving an inch or so attached.
• Roast the beetroot whole in a 180°C oven. Test them with a knife before you put them in so you know how hard they are and then try to insert the point of the knife after an hour in the oven. Test them every 30 minutes ofter that until they are softened. This could take anything up to three hours.
• Cool the beetroots - its best to cook them the day before you need them.
• Peel the beets by hand - the skins should slip off easily.
• Slice the beets as thinly as you can and arrange in one overlapping layer on the serving plates.
• Cut the ginger into very fine julienne (thin strips) and sprinkle a little over. If raw ginger is too strong for you, you could deep fry it first. This preserves some of the flavour but takes out the bite.
• Sprinkle with a few coriander leaves.
• Grind black pepper over the plates and make sure there is more available on the table.
• Squeeze about a teaspoon of lemon juice and a half a tablespoon of olive oil over each plate and serve.
• If the beetroot leaves are nice, select the smallest of them for a garnish. The larger ones can be thrown into a stirfry. This leaf is what is known as Swiss chard.

Notes To cut the ginger finely enough requires a very sharp knife. One of the best knives I have found for home use is the 'stay sharp' variety that has a sharpener in the sheath. Every time you pull it out or put it in, it gets a touch up. So many otherwise sensible people spend good money on bad knives. Serrated edge knives are not sharp and never will be. A chef's knife requires more maintenance than most people are willing to provide in a domestic kitchen. No professional chef would be caught dead using a 'stay sharp' but they are the perfect compromise for home use.