Pickled beet surplus

April 15, 2011 2:59 PM

Does anyone have any good ideas/recipes/uses for pickled beets?

I'm not a very creative "ad-lib-in-the-kitchen" type of person and would love some suggestions here. I have a stock of pickled beets I'd like to use up. My very lazy Googling effort brings up lots of recipes to make pickled beets but not so many on using them. I'd prefer to use them in a dish (salad/sandwhich/whatever) or recipe rather than just eating them plain and by themselves. Do you have a favorite use for pickled beets? Are there any traditional regional uses in the US? I'd love to hear 'em.

P.S. I don't mind acquiring more pickled beets for an interesting looking recipe so no need to worry about quantities. Cheers!

posted by moxiequz to food & drink (23 answers total)

I would try them fried. Almost like fried pickles.
posted by elpea at 3:03 PM on April 15, 2011 [1 favorite]

They go great shaved into many simple salads. Tad sweet and tart. Also work as a garnish to go with fish, similar to how pickled ginger is used with sushi.
posted by straight_razor at 3:10 PM on April 15, 2011

The newfie part of my family adds them to potato salad. Yum!
posted by sunshinesky at 3:14 PM on April 15, 2011

Add them to potato salad or macaroni salad, and the whole thing will turn a festive fuchsia! Looks and tastes great.

I'll bet that deep-fried pickled beets would look horrifying but be delicious.

Once you're done with the beets, don't throw the brine away! Hard-boil a bunch of eggs, peel off the shells, drop the eggs in the brine and leave it in the fridge for a week. I love pink pickled eggs almost as much as I love pickled beets.
posted by Faint of Butt at 3:18 PM on April 15, 2011 [1 favorite]

I usually eat them as a topping for green salad, but I also love to put a layer on a tuna sandwich, with a crusty bread and tuna made with lots of herbs (dill!).
posted by Swisstine at 3:27 PM on April 15, 2011

I will second red beet pickled eggs. They are fantastic. I also eat them with a little bit of pepper as a side veggie.
posted by godshomemovies at 3:29 PM on April 15, 2011

If you want to tone down really harsh horseradish, you can mash it with some pickled beets and use it on sandwiches & stuff spicy& sweet. I especially like it on roast beef.
posted by Tchad at 3:30 PM on April 15, 2011

Eat with hummus and/or on falafel sandwiches. Mmmmmm.
posted by rkent at 3:31 PM on April 15, 2011

Chop beets and hardboiled eggs. Mix. Season to taste (dill, vinegar, sugar, etc.). Maybe add yogurt or sour cream and chopped red onions.
posted by momus_window at 3:32 PM on April 15, 2011 [1 favorite]

sliced picked beets and a fried egg... on top of a hamburger. welcome to Australia.
posted by GuyZero at 3:33 PM on April 15, 2011 [2 favorites]

Kind of a cop-out, but i rock them at home on a cheese and/or charcuterie plate. they go particularly well with rillettes and cured duck.

Charcuterie plate without pickles is criminal.

Mmmmmmbeets.
posted by furnace.heart at 3:33 PM on April 15, 2011

inside of a sandwich (though only BARBARIANS would eat them in a 'burger)
posted by ivan ivanych samovar at 3:35 PM on April 15, 2011

I ate an entire jar of them once, straight up, when I was little. Delicious. I pooped purple the next day.

Also fantastic in salads and on sandwiches. (I also used to like to plop them down into mashed potatoes to make scary bloodshot monster eyes.)
posted by phunniemee at 3:49 PM on April 15, 2011 [2 favorites]

Done this with farm fresh and pickled. Different and both good!
posted by oflinkey at 3:50 PM on April 15, 2011 [1 favorite]

Mix the beets with some cut-up orange wedges. Add whatever other salad-like ingredients you have on-hand: greens, goat cheese, almonds, olives, etc. Maybe sprinkle some of the pickling liquid over the top, if it's not too intensely sour, and toss.

Add some fresh bread & butter, some beer / wine, and you've got a nice light lunch.
posted by molybdenum at 4:11 PM on April 15, 2011

There's a bar in my neighborhood that does a hamburger with a fried egg, a slice of pineapple, and a few slices of pickled beets. The fried egg I could take or leave, but the pineapple and the beets together are lovely.
posted by clockwork at 5:12 PM on April 15, 2011

Chilled pickled beets and a dab of sour cream are a great side to a hot roast pork sandwich. I also like some cold pickled beets chopped into sliced cold roasted turnips, with a little fresh dill weed, black pepper, fresh basil, and fresh or dried marjoram, and some creamy horseradish sauce, as a side to a cold lamb sandwich. Cold pickled beets, with equal amounts of chilled cucumber and a couple tablespoons of chopped sweet onion, with cracked black pepper and fresh basil, and a couple tablespoons per serving of good olive oil and cider vinegar per serving, make any fresh grilled oily fish (like mackrel, blue fish, salmon, sword fish, orange roughy, etc.) sit up and take notice, as a side dish.
posted by paulsc at 8:04 PM on April 15, 2011

Shredded beets, shredded carrots and chopped onion make a nice unexpected salad combination. Oil and lemon juice for dressing, and maybe some herbs: dill's good, oregano's good, or you can go quasi-Middle-Eastern with it and add cinnamon and cumin.

Also, if you do go for pickled eggs, I have two suggestions. One is to add some black peppercorns to the brine, for extra zing. The other is, if you're feeling artistic, you can just crackle the eggshells rather than peeling them all the way off. The pink brine seeps in through the cracks and you get this pink-and-white marbled effect that's just the most stylish thing imaginable — at least, if you imagine that you're a housewife from central Pennsylvania in the early 1960s. Anyway, it's cute and just as tasty and it's actually less work than peeling the eggs all the way.
posted by nebulawindphone at 8:55 PM on April 15, 2011 [1 favorite]

As a pizza topping with arugula (or whatever green) and a pesto sauce.
posted by powpow at 8:17 AM on April 16, 2011

Thank you everyone for your great suggestions! Looking forward to trying them all out. :)
posted by moxiequz at 1:33 PM on April 16, 2011

Chicken salad

Really, really good on a hot day.
posted by kjs4 at 11:40 PM on April 17, 2011

I like 'em in salad with goat cheese.
posted by ObscureReferenceMan at 10:15 AM on April 18, 2011

Just came across this recipe for a Siberian soup called Barscz a la Polonaise, which calls for sour beets, which are a fermented beet pickle. I don't know what kind of pickled beets you've got, but it sounds like a helluva stew.
posted by clockwork at 11:54 AM on April 23, 2011