Orange Beet Summer Salad

My new favorite food for the summer are beets! Usually beets make me think of Dwight Schrute (The Office) but they are actually really good roasted or canned. These colorful root vegetables contain powerful nutrient compounds that help protect against heart disease, birth defects and certain cancers, especially colon cancer. They also have cleansing properties and provide a boost of energy from natural sugars. Beets are a perfect addition to summer salads because they taste great with citrus fruits, like oranges! I experimented with this salad this week and finally came up with a good mix. The recipe isn't exact, I really just threw stuff together.

Ingredients
large handful of baby spinach
1/2 can of stringed or sliced beets
1/2 of an orange, chopped
1/2 of a red pepper, chopped
small handful of  walnuts
1/2 grapefruit, juiced
1 tsp. of apple cider vinegar

After you chop the orange, red pepper, and beets (if not already chopped), toss together with spinach and walnuts. Then, take 1/2 of the grapefruit and just squeeze out the juice, being mindful of any seeds that fall out. Add the juice and vinegar to the salad and enjoy! The grapefruit juice is actually kind of hard to taste because of the overpowering of the vinegar, oranges, and beets, so its really optional.

What are some of your favorite summer salad ingredients?