How Sweet It Is to Love…Beets!

Who knew beets were très romantique? We did!

Though perhaps one of the homelier cousins in the veggie family, beets have been heralded as a potent aphrodisiac since the time of the ancient Romans. Talk about a good reason to not judge the proverbial book by its cover! This all-natural love potion will add color, flavor, and a little sumpin’ sumpin’ to your Valentine’s Day without the typical overload of synthetic dyes and doses of refined sugar. How might such a wondrous thing be possible, you may ask?

Good question! As anyone who’s enjoyed a beet or two  knows, beets are richly pigmented due to their abundance of nutrients and minerals. The same pigment that can annoyingly stain chopping boards and hands (pro tip: rinse with lemon juice to remove stains!) can turn your baked goods a gorgeous fuchsia hue. Cake batter, frosting, white chocolate bark — all can be tinted the color of the season using beets. There’s plenty of ways to customize this trick to fit your preferred aesthetic. To create a subtle rosy glow, tip a bit of beet juice into your yellow-based batter: most vanilla cake mixes are naturally yellow, or you can add a few drops of maple syrup to achieve the right tone. For those who feel more passionately about beets and want that earthy sweetness to really come through, purée cooked beets and gently incorporate with other wet ingredients.

We’ve cobbled together a cute infographic to illustrate this beets-as-food-dye technique:

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Easy peasy, right?!

Want to make your Valentine swoon but not buying into the whole it’s-gotta-be-pink idea? Consider yourself covered. We’re loving these Superfood Truffles for a some pretty powerful reasons: they’re crazy easy to prepare, they’re decadent enough to satisfy even the sweetest of teeth, and they can count as two servings of vegetables! Yup. We’ll say it again: you can eat dessert and cross two veggies off your five-a-day. Oh my yum: we’re in love!

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