I’ve complained before about the pointlessness of selling cooked beetroot, often, to make matters worse, pickled in nasty vinegar. They do treat us like indolent idiots, those supermarkets.
If your best beetroot experience is that of a bland salad with bland, sour, floppy slices mixed in, rendering everything crimson – blame the shops, not your mum. I think only recently raw beetroots have started to turn up in supermarkets and on market stalls.
Nothing to be scared of – don a pair of disposable gloves for peeling, chopping, grating and handling, lest the crimson spreading on your palms should freak you out.
This is really gorgeous – beetroot baked long, loooong, you might even consider biscuit beetroot: cooked twice. Pre-cooked on Sunday afternoon, or when you can be bothered, and browned off to finish the next evening, to serve with fish or pork.