Beet Salad with Rainbow Vegetables and Horseradish Dressing

Recipe Difficulty: Medium, or, optional easier method!

Recipe Tags: Beet Balls, Creamy Horseradish Dressing, Rainbow Salad, Vegan

About My Rainbow Veg Salad
This salad is a spin on the ubiquitous salads I've had many times in Switzerland. Pretty much on every menu, you can order a salad that consists of a rainbow of colourful vegetables and is typically served with a sweet creamy white dressing.

In my version, instead of using of straight up cooked and chunked beets,  I made my beet, walnut and brown rice veggie mixture, and rolled them into little meatballs. The texture isn't meaty, they are more soft/delicate, and the taste is of sweet beet with a bit of smoky earthiness from the paprika & cumin. Somehow I just really love them. I like veggie mixtures that taste like vegetables, I'm not a vegan that necessarily wants things to taste like meat. (I do enjoy some veggie bacon, seitan chick'n and the occasional ground round, but it's not my go to at all.)

The other difference between my salad and the ones I have had in Switzerland, is that I add horseradish to the dressing.  I love horseradish and I find the combination of the zippy creamy dressing and the crunchy sweet fresh vegetables irresistible. If you aren't a fan you can omit the horseradish, it will just be a creamy white French dressing. I think adding fresh herbs would be really delicious too. Fresh dill chopped in there would probably be my first choice! 

What is in my Salad?
Greens
Corn Niblets
Grated/Spiralized Carrot
Cucumber
Tomatoes
Beet Veggie balls 
Toasted Pecans
Creamy Horseradish Dressing

Easier Option: If you don't want to make the beet balls, go ahead and add in cooked and cooled beets instead! It will be very similar to the ones I've had many times in Switzerland. 

​Assembly

• Add a bed of greens to a large shallow bowl. 
• Add piles of your favourite veggies along with beet balls (or just cooked beets). I recommend using what I have suggested above. I like having all of the variety, so I personally wouldn't omit any of them. Season with salt and pepper.
• Drizzle everything with a generous amount of the creamy horseradish dressing. Enjoy!

Horseradish Dressing
I love this dressing!!!! It really pairs perfectly with sweet, fresh, crunchy veggies. I love it on this salad, and I also really like just dipping veggie sticks into it for snacking. I haven't tried it in other recipes but I would like to. I originally published the recipe to make 2 cups, but I have changed the amounts to yield 4 cups. I always make a small batch, then end up making another batch a couple of days later, so....I changed the recipe. You can decide how much you would like to make. All I know is I like lots of the dressing on my salad. 

Vegan Yogurt
I have only ever made this using Silk Almond Yogurt. If you are going to substitute it for something else, it will potentially change the amounts of other things you add. Other yogurts might have more acidity, and also there are vegan yogurts out there that I just don't like. Definitely don't use coconut yogurt in this recipe. Honestly, even though I like using Silk Almond yogurt in this recipe since it adds fiber and protein to the dressing, using 100% vegan mayo would be something I'm sure would taste good too. I use a combination of both so I can have a bit of extra richness from the mayo, but still get the nutritional value from the yogurt. 

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