Vegetables

Beetroot is good gently baked in its skin (loosely wrapped in foil), served with butter or sour cream and plenty of black pepper as an accompanying vegetable to plain roasts, grills or meaty white fish. Simply boiled, it slices into purplish salads with ingredients such as eggs, potatoes, onion, garlic, chives, pickled or smoked fish, or fruit such as apple or orange. Parsnips make fine soggy chips, and purée well, although liberal doses of butter and/or cream are essential; toasted sesame seeds are a successful complementary flavour.