Rebecca’s recipe of the week: Warm Kale Salad with Quinoa and Balsamic Roasted Beets | Canalside Community Food

serves 4

Ingredients

for the roasted beets

500g beets, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar (this is not the occasion to use your super-pricy, genuine-from-Modena balsamic vinegar)
3 tablespoons demerara sugar
2 tablespoons grape seed oil (or some other neutral oil)
salt and pepper

for the rest of the salad

1/2 cup quinoa, rinsed
2 tbsp grape seed oil (or some other neutral oil)
1 clove of garlic, peeled and finely sliced
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
all the Canalside kale in your share (say, 180g), stems removed and leaves torn into bite-size pieces
salt and pepper
1 handful of pecorino cheese shavings (or use parmesan)
1 handful toasted hazelnuts (optional)

Preheat the oven to 200C.

Place the trimmed beetroot in a 2-inch deep ceramic or glass dish. Pour the balsamic vinegar and grape seed oil over the beets. Sprinkle the muscovado sugar, salt and pepper around the beets. Cover the dish with foil and roast for 30 minutes. Remove the foil, stir the beets up a bit and continue to roast, uncovered, for perhaps another 15-20 minutes. They should be quite tender. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.

Meanwhile, prepare the quinoa: place the quinoa, 1 cup of water, and a pinch of salt in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Once it reaches a boil reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for about 15 minutes or until quinoa is mostly cooked and the little tails start to pop out. Remove from the heat and set aside.

In a large pot, heat the 2 tbsp of grapeseed oil over medium heat. Add the sliced garlic and smoked paprika. Stir around until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add the quinoa, a splash of water and half of the kale. Stir around until kale begins to wilt a bit. Add the remaining kale, season with salt and pepper and keep stirring. The kale should all be slightly wilted, but still firm. Take off the heat and transfer kale and quinoa mixture to your serving bowl.

Arrange the roasted beets on top of the greens and quinoa. Drizzle the salad with the balsamic cooking liquid from the pan in which you roasted the beetroot (there should be about 1/4 cup of it left). Scatter the pecorino shavings and hazelnuts (if you’re adding these) on top and serve.

(Recipe adapted from The First Mess.)