Beetroot is one of those vegetables people either love or hate. Roasting beetroot in olive oil and sea salt is completely different to eating tiny balls of vacuum packed beetroot soaked in vinegar. So if you have negative experiences of beetroot please give this roasted recipe a go.

Beetroot provides a big flash of colour in the middle of winter and eating different coloured food is a way of making sure you are getting lots of vitamins and other nutrients.  The orange adds to the colour and goodness here and goes really well with the beetroot and the feta.

Roasting everything on a tray could not be more easy, there’s very little to do. Just make sure you don’t over cook everything or the vegetables will cook right down to nothing – you want some big chunks of beetroot glistening on your bed of salad greens. I’ve used a mixed bag of watercress, spinach and rocket.

Serves two for a main course or four as a first course.

Ingredients

• 4 raw beetroots, washed and chopped into quarters
• 1 green or red pepper, roughly chopped
• 2 red onions, chopped into quarters
• 1 orange cut into segments
• 50g feta cheese
• Handful of sunflower and pumpkin seeds
• Tablespoon of olive oil
• Dressing – 3 parts olive oil, 1 part wine or cider vinegar, teaspoon mustard, salt and pepper (and shake in a jar)
• Sea salt and ground back pepper

Method 

1. Arrange the beetroot, onion and pepper on an oven tray and coat well with olive oil. Season and cook in a pre-heated oven at 190C for 30 minutes or until beetroot is tender but not overcooked.
2. Toast the pumpkin and sunflower seeds by dry frying them in a pan for about three minutes.
3. Arrange the vegetables on the salad greens and crumble over the feta. Add the orange segments and mix in the salad dressing. Garnish with the toasted seeds.