Last Twinnerparty recipe today! Hope you are all set for tomorrow night, I will write a few tips later on to save time, like the things you can make ahead and so on. A huge thank you to Julian from Bubble Brothers who has posted his suggestions for wines to go with the full meal, so if you are into your wines, head over there to see which wine goes with what! Kick off time for the twinnerparty is 7pm, with an aim to serve the first course at 7.30pm, but as we are all mostly from Ireland, timing of things normally goes out the window, but sure we'll see!
Beetroot, Goats Cheese, Pine Nut and Rocket Salad
This is a really tasty starter dish which is perfect for preparing the ingredients ahead of time and simply assembling them at the last minute to create a pretty impressive salad. If you don't want to roast the beetroot yourself, you can by precooked vac packed ones in the supermarket.
Serves 6
6 medium sized beetroot
75g pine nuts
250g goats cheese, cut into bitesize pieces
60g rocket leaves
3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon of Dijon mustard
Half a clove of garlic, minced
A good pinch of sea salt and ground black pepper
You can cook the beetroot ahead of time if you wish, simply wrap them in tinfoil, place on an oven tray and bake for about an hour at 190C/Gas Mark 5 or until you can insert a fork smoothly. Remove from the oven, allow to cool, then peel with knife and slice into quarters.
On a large frying pan, over a medium heat, toast the pine nuts, until golden brown, make sure to keep an eye on them as they can burn quite easily.
In a large bowl whisk together the Dijon mustard, oil, vinegar, garlic, salt and pepper and set aside.
When you are ready to serve the salad, arrange the beetroot quarters and goats cheese pieces on each plate. Toss the rocket leaves in the dressing and place a little on each plate. Finally scatter each plate with the toasted pine nuts and serve straight away!
