Exciting right? Okay so maybe not everyones idea of an exciting ingredient but I know I had a ton of fun with it. I immediately thought of bacon, I've really been into the sweet and salty thing lately so it was only natural to turn to the candy of the meat world. I also had some oranges and lemons kicking around from my last Urban Harvest delivery that needed to be used up, so why not make a citrus glaze?? Perfect.

2 medium beets

1 tbsp honey

juice of 1/2 orange

juice of 1/2 lemon

pinch of lemon and orange zest

pinch of cinnamon

3-4 strips nitrate free bacon

Scrub the beets well, rub a small amount of olive oil on them and pop them whole into the oven at 350 for 20 minutes to slightly soften. Keep the oven on as you will be using it again shortly. Once done and cooled, peel and cut beets [I cut mine too big, they took too long to cook and were hard to eat. This recipe should be made as a one bite appy so cut the beets into an inch thick pieces by about an inch and a half to 2 inches long.] 

Make the glaze in a bowl that will fit all the beets. Melt honey, add the orange and lemon juice along with a small amount of their zest and the pinch of cinnamon. Mix together, add the beets and toss until well coated. [I then refrigerated the beets in the bowl, thinking the glaze would cool down and stick better. I found this was an unnecessary step.] 

Prep a shallow baking pan by slightly oiling it. Now, use a piece of beet to measure how long you should cut your bacon, it should wrap around at least one and a half times. Once you have wrapped the bacon around your glazed beet piece, use a toothpick to keep it all in place. [I tried to cut my bacon in half lengthwise so I could wrap it along the bigger pieces of beet. It was really tricky to to and I wasn't happy with the outcome. Make sure you wrap the bacon over itself.]

Place the little bundles of bacon wrapped goodness into your baking pan, drizzle with a little of the leftover glaze and pop into the oven for another 30 minutes. Check on them periodically to make sure the bacon doesn't burn. [Mine did.]

1 medium beet

1/2 cup coconut flour

1/2 cup cocoa powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

5 eggs

3 tbsp butter (olive or coconut oil will work too)

1/2 - 3/4 cup honey

Add eggs, melted butter and honey to pureed beets and mix well. In a separate bowl, mix together the coconut flour, cocoa powder, soda and salt. Gradually add dry ingredients to wet, stirring in well. 

Spoon into well oiled muffin tins, filling them about 3/4 full. Bake at 375 for 15-20 minutes, until toothpick comes out clean. Remove from muffin tin and allow to cool. 

These turned out so moist and chocolately and great, which I was surprised about considering coconut flour tends to yield a more dry baked treat. Must be the beets!