The Benefits of Beets for Healthy Living

Very few people enjoy eating beets.  By adding beets to your diet, you increase your body’s ability to digest food, build red blood cells, improve liver function, lower cholesterol, decrease the risk of heart disease, prevent gallstones, improve weight loss, and  prevents constipation according to Phyllis and James Balch authors of Prescription for Nutritional Wellness.  There are two ways you can enjoy the benefits of beets in your diet: raw and cooked.  Raw beets are much more beneficial and if you are an avid juicer, it is recommended that you add a chunk of beets to your juice drinks to take advantage of the abundance of vitamin and minerals in the vegetable.  I like beets but I believe boiled beets taste very earthy and fleshy, and I mix them in rice to cover the taste. However, for those of you who avoid the vegetable like the plague because of its very earthy and fleshy taste, I stumbled upon a recipe, which I think you might enjoy.  It is called Sweet Potato and Beet Hash and you can select the link to get the full recipe.  I just have a few recommendations for substitutes to reduce the fat amounts in the recipe.  The original recipe calls for vegetable oil and bacon.  You can replace these two ingredients with cooking spray and turkey bacon.  You can also use Morningstar meatless bacon or Canadian bacon for less fat. 

I served the dish with grilled tilapia and an oil-free pesto sauce.  I modified this pesto recipe.  Instead of using the nutritional yeast I used two teaspoons of Parmesan, eliminated the salt, and used one tablespoon of safflower oil.  I used half the can of beans and ended up with 1 cup of pesto and placed one tablespoon of sauce on each piece of fish, but you may use more.  The only thing I had to purchase for this recipe was the basil, garlic, and navy beans which cost $5 because I bought minced garlic instead of cloves.  If you use one tablespoon of pesto on your meat or fish, it equals $.62 per serving. 

The cost of the Hash Ingredients assuming you have onion and your bacon choice on hand already is $3.20 for fresh beets and one large sweet potato at Walmart.  If you purchase meat, bacon, and one onion add another $10 to your total.  The recipe is enough for 3-4 servings (1-1 1/3 cup), which is between $3.30 to 4.40 for each meal plus the $.62 per serving for the pesto .  This meal is less than $5 per serving.  The great thing about serving fish with sweet potato and beet hash is that it can be served as dinner or breakfast.

The entire meal was filling and delicious.  Nevertheless, you can use whatever lean meat you have on hand or prefer.  If you prefer a meatless meal simply serve it over a bed of brown rice with a salad.

Hash Mix

Pesto

Calories:

134

103

Fat:

< 1 g

2.1 g

Fiber:

5.2 g

7.5

Sodium:

158 mg

24 mg