Beetroot fritters with dill, mint & lemon

As you read this post, I’m in New York City and will soon be heading to my hometown of Toronto! But as I’m writing this, it’s a sunny Saturday in Utrecht and I’m about to head out into the city to be a spectator to a rubber boat parade in the canal… so I sort of feel like I’m doing some weird time-travelling right now.

In an attempt to be a good blogger, I’ve been prepping as many posts as I possibly can before we leave. The last few weeks of recipe testing have been all about beetroot – and the next several recipes will all be featuring it! This was actually unintentional, but I’ve come to terms with it. Let the beetroot bonanza begin!

These beetroot fritters were born of some seriously messy experimentation a few weeks ago. I was in my ‘turn anything and everything into patties’ phase (if you follow me on Instagram you’ll have seen the evidence!), and had been unable to resist the beets at the supermarket. The stovetop, the counter, the kettle, the coffee maker… everything was stained pink by the time I was through.

Not that I’ve gotten any more graceful when it comes to handling beets, but that time was particularly spectacular, what with the splashing of too-wet batter and beet-stained hands opening white cupboards.

(This time around the cupboards were spared, but I did waltz into a fairly important meeting the next day with beet stained hands and nails…)

That first time, I tossed a bit of grated potato into the mixture and, while the result was certainly edible, the fritters were generally uninspiring. The colour was dull, the texture wasn’t right, and the overriding flavour could best be described as ‘starchy’… But after some refinement, I’m in love with these beetroot fritters! I’ve ditched the potato and come to terms with the fact that the stove gives a far crispier outside than the oven ever could. Sometimes frying is simply the only way to go.

A few minutes in the pan and the beetroot turns an almost golden colour. The outside of the fritters gets crispy, while the inside gets nice and soft and buttery.

I serve these up with a super simple sauce of yoghurt flavoured with lemon juice, dill, and mint. It’s a trusty favourite, but it works beautifully in this dish (as it does with many others)!

Serve these fritters with a side salad or on their own as an appetizer. Because the beets are grated in raw, they have a slightly milder, fresher flavour than they do when they are cooked – so you might even be able to convince the beet-unenthusiasts in your life to give them a try!