Roasted Beet Salad with Mâche, Green Beans, Toasted Walnuts and Roquefort

We are right in the thick of gearing up for Halloween night around here. For Glen and Max Halloween is one of the most important holidays of the year, right up there with Christmas and Max’s birthday. They plot and plan possible costumes that Max might wear, they discuss how many fog machines and coloured lights will be needed and where these should be placed. They dig graves and get out the power tools and make head stones and graveyard crosses that they splatter with red paint. They trample every last flower, herb and vegetable in the front garden in their quest to hang fake cobwebs from the trees and fence posts. They meticulously position the mini wind machines that so gracefully blow the gauzy robes of the half dozen ghoulish monsters and demons dangling from the trees. There are cauldrons of dry ice and rolls of “do not cross” police tape and countless skeletons hanging about, vampires and black cats and of course a bunch of carved pumpkins too.

I buy the candy.

Last year when my neighbour complimented me on the Halloween decorations I admitted to her that I really had nothing to do with it, that it was all the hard work of  Max and Glen. She replied “Yeah, you can kind of tell. It doesn’t have that matchy-matchy Martha Stewart vibe that you have going on…” Ouch!

Anyway, in addition to buying the candy, I also make the dinner.

Tonight we are having the grandparents and some friends over and since we will be consumed with running back and forth to the door to hand out the treats (we generally get around 200 kids) I need to keep it relatively simple. I am going to make a big pot of garlic pasta (to keep the vampires away) and a couple of mushroom and radicchio lasagnas (because my sweet friends Sheryl and Jenny dropped off some stunning Chanterelles that Jenny foraged for herself on the Sunshine Coast!) and the roasted beet salad that you see above.

Blood red beets seem appropriate for the holiday and this salad is great because all of the components can be prepped ahead of time. It can be served on a big platter family style, which is what I will do tonight, or individually plated for a more elegant approach.  And after all of those mini chocolate bars that I will inadvertently scarf down tonight, a few nutrient rich beets on the menu seems like a very good idea. Happy Halloween.

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3 Responses to Roasted Beet Salad with Mâche, Green Beans, Toasted Walnuts and Roquefort

  1. Sheryl says:

    Well, here is a compliment for you – last night Jenny said she didn't feel like cooking dinner, then read your blog and got up and happily made a seriously good mushroom pasta… Thanks, Julie!!

  2. Leslie says:

    Hmmm…..I am remembering the dinners I would serve on Halloween evening for my three children before they flew out the door.

    Grilled cheese sandwiches with Heinz ketchup no less.

    You are my idol.

  3. Sarolta says:

    That is the best Halloween yard! I love that photo! So spoooooky…..

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