Eating the rainbow with pear and beetroot salad

There’s a wonderful mantra going around the healthy eating scene at the moment, and it’s all about “eating the rainbow”. It means enjoying a rich variety of fresh fruit and veg every day in as many colours as possible. This is because the colour reflects the type of nutrients you’ll get from that particular fruit, so eating the rainbow means maximising the amount of nutrients you are giving your body. Check out Nutrition Australia for more.

Home gardeners can also take the concept one step further by growing the rainbow! Rather than planting just one or two plants, go for broke and plant a wide range of delicious, colourful fruit and veg.

My backyard garden - even leafy greens come in the colours of the rainbow!

In summer this might mean red plants like tomatoes, strawberries and rhubarb, purple/blue plants like blueberries, eggplant and beetroot, orange plants including rockmelon, carrots and corn, your leafy greens plus cucumbers and peas, and finally potatoes and onions to represent the brown/white group. How amazing does that all sound – fresh, organic, and glowing with sunny goodness! From a practical perspective, it also means if one crop fails you’ve still got plenty of others to choose from.

Organic beetroots - if you grow your own, use the leaves too.

Today’s salad covers the rainbow spectrum: buerre bosc pears (white/brown), beetroot (purple), avocado, broccoli leaves and kale (green), yellow silverbeet/chard (green and yellow), and red in the form of a few drops of divine pomegranate molasses. Beurre bosch pears are lovely and crunchy and sweet but any other pear will do.

The beautiful beurre bosc pear

Pear and beetroot salad

2 small or 1 medium beetroot

Extra virgin olive oil

Leafy greens – I used kale, broccoli leaves and silverbeet

1 beurre bosch pear, sliced, diced or cut into wedges

1 small avocado

½ tsp apple cider vinegar

1-2 tbs water

Salt

Paprika

Pomegranate molasses (optional)

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Place your halved beetroots on a square of foil with a small drizzle of oil and a sprinkle of salt. Fold the foil around the beetroots into a parcel, and roast for 30 minutes. Unwrap, cool and cut the beetroots into small cubes.

To make your avocado dressing, mash or blend your avocado with the vinegar, a pinch of paprika, a tiny pinch of salt and just enough water to reach a creamy liquid consistency.

Finely slice your greens, pile them up on a plate and decorate with the pear and beetroot. Drizzle the avocado over the top and add a few drops of pomegranate molasses – this is optional but adds a wonderful zingy sweet dimension. Step back and admire how spectacularly beautiful this salad is, then toss it in to a lovely colourful mess and serve.

I went a little OTT on the presentation but seriously, how pretty is this salad!