beetloaf - it's what's for dinner

One of my favorite lunch spots in SF is Atlas Cafe. I especially love their golden beetloaf sandwich - which is really, REALLY good. I order it almost every time I go there -- and I'd been wanting to try and recreate it at home. So I took a stab at coming up with a recipe. I had a pretty good idea, just from eating it so many times, and was able to deduce most of the basic ingredients. After a little research, I came up with a recipe for my first trial run. This is it...

Recipe --
1 cup uncooked quinoa
2 raw beets, peeled + grated
1 small rutabaga, peeled + grated
1-2 small carrots, peeled + grated
1 onion, minced
1/2 cup bread crumbs
2 tbl fresh basil, minced
2 tbl fresh parsley, minced
2 eggs, beaten
1 tbl garlic salt
2 tbl tomato paste
1 tbl ketchup
1 tbl whole grain mustard
1 tbl olive oil
salt + pepper, to taste

The quinoa serves a duel purpose -- it acts as a binding agent and also helps bulk up the end product. I cook quinoa like steamed rice (2:1 ration, water to grain). Bring water to a boil, stir in quinoa (rinsed) and cover. Simmer 15 - 20 min, until cooked through. If all water has evaporated, but the grain still isn't cooked through, just add a bit more water and continue to cook until done. Cool completely.

I combined the quinoa, beets, carrots, rutabaga, onion, bread crumbs and minced herbs. In a separate bowl I beat eggs and combined them with the garlic salt, tomato paste, ketchup, whole grain mustard, olive oil, salt and pepper. I then slowly added the egg mixture to the beets and other vegetables -- I was looking for the consistency to be like that of a traditional meatloaf. (Use judgment as to whether you should add all of mixture, less or more -- it all sort of depends on the size of beets, carrots, etc. as to how much moisture you'll need). Once I had the proper consistency, I spread the mixture into a shallow dish and roasted it at 400° for around 45 min (up to 1 hr). And voila! Beetloaf!

I decided to serve it as a sandwich -- on ciabatta bread, with havarti cheese, arugula and a pesto spread -- with heirloom tomato capease salad. Mmmmm -- so good!




The final product was pretty good (and made a lot more than I expected!)...definitely not bad for my first attempt. A couple of ideas for making it even better: roasting the root vegetables and processing them in a food processor before combining with the other ingredients. I think roasting them first would help to intensify the flavors -- and processing would give the final product better texture. I'm going to try it again soon (with these adjustments) and will let you know how it goes!