Beetroot is one of the few strong flavours left to us once the chilli and the pepper are gone. Roasting concentrates the sweetness, and the lemon stops it being heavy.
Serves 4. About 0.3 g fat and 100 kcal per serving.
Phase & care: P1 for the beetroot, apple and dill. The whole dish sits comfortably in the gentle phase. Tolerance varies per person, so start with a small bowl.
Ingredients
- 500 g (about 1 lb) beetroot, fresh
- 2 apples, peeled and cored
- Juice of 1 lemon, plus a little zest
- 1 tablespoon fresh dill, chopped
- 1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped
- 1 teaspoon honey
- A pinch of salt
Method
- Heat the oven to 200 C (400 F). Wrap the whole unpeeled beetroots in foil and roast for 50 to 60 minutes, until a knife goes through easily. Let them cool enough to handle.
- Rub the skins off under cold running water. They come away with your thumb. Cut into 1 cm (half inch) cubes.
- Dice the peeled apple the same size.
- Whisk the lemon juice, zest, honey and salt together. That is the whole dressing. No oil.
- Fold everything together with the herbs. Rest it for ten minutes before serving so the apple takes on the colour.
Buy the vacuum-packed cooked beetroot if you want this in five minutes instead of an hour. Check the packet: plain cooked beetroot is fine, the ones in vinegar are a different thing and vinegar is a small-amounts, later-phase item for me.
It keeps three days covered in the fridge and gets better on day two.
Stepan’s rule: when a dish needs no oil to taste of something, I keep the recipe. Those are the ones that make a low-fat week feel like cooking instead of restriction.
More like this
Also low fat and easy on a sore pancreas: the leek and potato soup and the mushroom and rice soup. The full system, with the fat budget in grams and all 75 recipes, is in the book.
Not medical advice. This recipe reflects one patient’s low-fat approach grounded in published guidance. Fat tolerance is individual. Check with your own healthcare team before changing your diet.