Marco’s Salt Baked Beetroot & Goat’s Cheese Salad
Serves 2
Suitable for Vegetarians
This recipe comes from celebrity chef, Marco Pierre White.
“This is one of the best-selling dishes across the restaurant chains, it has been on all the menus for decades in one form or another.” Marco Pierre White
Ingredients
- 260g salt-baked beetroot, see method
- 40g goat’s cheese
- 20g candied walnuts
- 2g micro parsley
- 20ml walnut oil
- 2ml Merlot vinegar
- 2g Maldon salt
Candied walnuts, prep a day in advance
- 100g caster sugar
- 100ml water
- 100g walnut halves
- 50g icing sugar
- 10ml vegetable oil
Method
Individually wrap a beetroot in tin foil and place onto a roasting tray lined with a bed of table salt, bake at 160C until just cooked.
Remove from the foil and allow to cool for 5 minutes, whilst still hot peel the skin from the beetroot by hand, use a few pairs of blue gloves to protect your hands from the heat if required.
Once peeled, toss in a little olive oil and store until needed.
Candy the walnuts by making a 50/50 stock syrup with the water and sugar, once boiling add the nuts and boil for 5 minutes. Leave the nuts in the syrup overnight and allow to soak up the syrup. When ready, drain away the syrup (this can be used again) Lay the nuts on a lined baking tray.
Bake in the oven at 150C until they are crisp and dry, the sugar should have crystalised during drying. Break the nuts up into small chunks before using.
To plate, slice the beetroot on a mandolin very thinly and dress lay in a bowl, add the merlot vinegar and walnut oil to the bowl to marinade and dress the slices.
Slice the cheese and allow it to sit at room temperature as cold cheese will not eat well.
Layer up the marinated slices with the cheese on a plate making sure the last layer is beetroot.
Any leftover dressing in the bowl can be used to dress the plate.
Garnish with the crumbled nuts and finish with washed, chilled and drained micro parsley just before serving.