ROASTED BEETS IN SALT DOUGH
Sturdy root vegetables like beets, carrots, parsnips and even turnip can be startlingly improved by baking or roasting. The most common way to do this is simply dicing them, tossing them with oil and placing them on a baking sheet. It’s a good technique, because it browns and caramelizes the natural sugars in the vegetables and brings out their sweetness. Baking them in a salt crust gives a very different result. Pan-roasted vegetables are sometimes leathery, but salt-crusted vegetables retain much of their moisture and develop a deeper, subtler flavor. Many recipes simply bury the vegetables in coarse salt, but in this case we’ll use a salt-heavy dough. The finished beets won’t taste salty, just well-seasoned.
Ingredients
1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
2/3 salt
water, as needed
2-4 large basil leaves
2 large beets, whole
Method
Heat your oven to 375 degrees F.
In the bowl of a stand mixer or food processor, combine 1 1/3 cups of all purpose flour and 2/3 cup of salt. Start the mixer at a low speed, or pulse the food processor, adding water just until the dough comes together in a ball and begins to spin around the bowl.
Flour your work surface lightly, and divide the dough. Roll out the first piece to about a 1/4-inch thickness. Place one or two of the basil leaves on the dough, and then one of the large beets. Fold the dough around the beet, trimming any excess with a paring knife, and then press the dough firmly to the beet to make a seamless coating.
Repeat with the remaining beet and basil leaf. Transfer the beets to a small baking dish, and roast for 1 ½ to 2 hours. The long cooking concentrates the beets’ flavors and alters their texture, but the crust prevents them from burning.
Remove the beets from the oven, and let them rest until they’re cool enough to handle. Crack the shell with a meat-tenderizing mallet or similar implement, and remove the beets (ideally with a gloved hand, to avoid staining your fingers). Their skins should stick to the crust, and slide off evenly.
Slice or dice the beets, and serve with a drizzle of pink sauce.
Note: You can use this technique with other dense vegetables as well. Try large carrots in a crust with dill or cumin, parsnips with fennel or caraway seed, or rutabagas with garlic and rosemary.
