Roasted Beet Salad with Chicken and Feta

Beets. I admit they didn't make my heart swoon before now. In fact, I didn't even try them before a couple of years ago. But I've always been intrigued by them because their color is just so beautiful. They look like rubies or garnets, what with their deep, beautiful reddish color.

Completely at a loss for how to cook them, though, I turned to my trusty Whole Foods App for inspiration, and this is what I came up with: Roasted Beet Salad. So pretty. So yummy. So easy. And I used three ingredients from the Farmers' Market--beets, red leaf lettuce, and red onion.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 lb. baby beets
2 T red onion, finely chopped
6 T lemon juice
1 tsp. yellow mustard
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp. sugar
salt & pepper to taste
1 head red leaf lettuce, washed & chopped
1/2 cup pecans (or more, if you like more. You could even use almonds or walnuts if you prefer.)
feta cheese, to taste (I used about 1/2 a standard size container)
2 chicken breasts, cooked and cubed

Method:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Remove the stems from the beets; wash thoroughly. Place on a parchment lined cookie sheet and roast in the oven for about an hour.
  
Check them by puncturing them with a fork--they should be nice & soft, but not mushy. Don't be put off by the oozing red mess that comes out of them. Remove from oven and let cool completely, and don't be put off by the way they turn gray and terribly gross-looking. After you peel them, they'll be beautiful.

When they're cool, put on some plastic gloves to protect your hands from being stained by these little rubies. Remove the skin and cube the beets. Set aside.


For the dressing, combine onion, lemon juice, mustard, sugar, and oil and salt and pepper in a little blender and blend until emulsified. If you don't have a little blender, you can whisk it by hand, but add the oil after you've already combined the first four ingredients, and add it slowly as you whisk.

Toss together lettuce, beets, cheese, and dressing until everything is lightly coated, then top with pecans. The beets will turn the cheese a slight shade of pink, but don't worry--it's so yummy you'll forgive it for being a strange color.

(Also, I would be remiss if I did not forewarn others of what we experienced after eating this salad. I will try to warn you as tactfully as I can... The brilliance of the beets' color filters through the human body and can be startling if you aren't aware of it. Be forewarned--nothing's wrong with you, the beets just pack quite a colorful punch!)