This is a delicious and satisfying salad that not only fills you up as a main, but offers many nutritional and detoxifying benefits.
Beets are incredible blood cleansers and contain naturally occurring nitrates, which are converted into nitric oxide in your body. Nitric oxide helps to relax and dilate your blood vessels, which not only improves your blood flow, but helps to lower blood pressure! Plus, they contain potassium and magnesium, two minerals that help to support heart health.
Sweet potatoes are rich in carotenoids; plant compounds that protect your cells from damage. You can tell fruits and veggies are rich in these compounds by their colour. Yellow, orange and bright red are all indicators of antioxidant rich carotenoids. Sweet potatoes are also rich in vitamin E, an antioxidant that helps to support heart health, plus it’s an anti-aging vitamin that can keeps your skin young, vibrant and wrinkle free!
And believe it or not, sweet potatoes contain even more potassium than bananas!
Now let’s talk about arugula. This peppery green is incredibly alkalinizing and supports liver detoxification. It belongs to the brassica vegetables (just like broccoli, brussel sprouts and cauliflower) and contains powerful detoxifying compounds such as sulforaphane and indole 3-carbinol. What does this even mean? Bottom line, it helps your liver to metabolize and breakdown excess estrogen, which in turn, helps to protect you against breast or ovarian cancer. Amazing right?
Many of my clients suffer with excess estrogen, otherwise known as estrogen dominance. Suffering with PMS, breast tenderness, excess weight, bloating and swollen lymph nodes can all be signs of estrogen dominance. It’s important to help flush this excess estrogen from your system to improve hormonal health and support the liver. This salad, along with other brassica vegetables and a lot of fiber can help you reduce excess estrogen and restore balance to your body.
This salad can take minutes to prepare IF you have leftover roasted sweet potato and beets on hand. Two foods I typically like to roast a lot of to have on hand for easy, grab and go meals. Otherwise, roasting your veggies will take a little bit of time, but it’s so worth it! Be sure to make extra and keep them in your fridge to enjoy as leftovers.
As with any salad, you can use whatever veggies you have on hand. It’s a great way to clean out your fridge. Feel free to get creative with this recipe by adding in cucumbers, celery, tomatoes or your favourite nuts and seeds.
Happy Foodie Friday!
Enjoy your detox salad 🙂
- 1 medium sweet potato, cut into 1-inch pieces and roasted*
- 2 medium beets, cut into cubes and roasted*
- 4 cups arugula or spinach
- 1/4 cup soft goats cheese, crumbled
- 2 tbsp hemp seeds
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 1 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- Add arugula to a large bowl. Add in roasted sweet potato, beets and hemp seeds.
- In a small bowl, whisk together dressing ingredients. Drizzle over salad, add crumbled goats cheese and toss well.
- Divide among two plates and serve.
- *Roasting Sweet Potato - Preheat oven to 350 F. Cover baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Wash and peel sweet potatoes. (I personally like to leave the peel on, especially if buying organic). Cut into 1-inch size pieces. Place the cut sweet potatoes onto the baking sheet. Sprinkle with sea salt, pepper and some chill flakes (optional). Bake for 45-55 minutes or until soft and cooked through.
- *Roasting Beets - Remove stems and leaves from beets and wash. Wrap beets in foil. Bake in 350°F oven for about 1 hour or until vegetables are fork-tender. Remove from foil and let stand for 15 to 20 minutes or until cool enough to handle. Loosen skins from beets and cut into cubes. You can place the beets in the foil onto the same tray as the sweet potato to roast at the same time.
- *Candied walnuts, pecans, pumpkin seeds, or almonds would all make delicious and healthy additions to this salad.
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