Beet

If blood oranges are unavailable, simply use the sweetest oranges you can find.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less. Makes use of the microwave oven.

Save the beet tops for a quick side dish: just sauté them with garlic and olive oil, sprinkle with lemon, salt and pepper, and serve.

The lovely color and tangy taste of this starter make it a real crowd pleaser. Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less but requires additional unattended time.

Choose beets and potatoes of about the same size.

Good cooks never discard the nutritious beet greens. Here, the greens are combined with roasted beets, capers and feta in a Greek-inspired salad. Offer this before roast leg of lamb with crisp potatoes.

A Scandinavian table is seldom without them.

A colorful dish with fresh — and surprisingly compatible — flavors.

This recipe originally accompanied Buffalo Steak and Onion Confit on Garlic Toasts .

For this fabulous salad we used red onions, beets, zucchini, eggplant, and bell peppers, but any mix of summer vegetables would work. The salad gets served with grilled bread and is nice with a white wine, like Sauvignon Blanc.

"I had three kids in three years when I was a 'young married' in my twenties," writes Sheryl Hurd-House of Jupiter, Florida. "That’s when I started cooking and realized I liked it. But I’m having even more fun cooking now that our children are grown and it’s just me and my husband, Garry." Fresh greens and a variety of colorful veggies add up to a great salad you can throw together in minutes.

Active time: 25 min Start to finish: 4 hr

Ana Garcia of Cuernavaca, Mexico, writes: "My great-grandmother, Josefina, was a highly regarded butcher, and she taught me the communal style of cooking that Mexico is known for. That's one of the reasons I opened my own cooking school, La Villa Bonita — to show others how authentic Mexican cuisine is prepared, as opposed to the usual tacos, burritos, and Tex-Mex dishes." My husband, Robb, and I also run our own restaurant, Reposado. He insisted that we open the place because he thought my recipes deserved a wider audience. At the restaurant I like to experiment — the menu at Reposado is nouvelle Mexican — but at my cooking school I feature more traditional recipes. Working at both places gives me the chance to show off both cooking styles. When beets are cooked as they are in this recipe, they turn a bright fuchsia color. Wear disposable plastic gloves when working with beets. Puree only one or two cups of hot soup at a time, holding the top of the blender firmly to keep it from flying off.