icons

beets and goat cheese, hear me out.

When mentioning icons, (and I do mean plural) what I mean are two or more beloved forces coming together to form something greater than the sum of its parts. Remember the line up of VH1’s “Divas Live” with singers who need no last name? Certain foods when combined develop icon status. There are combinations we adore like butter and jam. The duos I have the most respect for are the divisive ones.

There is a contentious relationship many people have with beets. The sweet earthy flavor doesn’t initially register as “yum.” Following the distaste people have vocalized for certain foods, goat cheese falls in line. If you’ve ever been to a farm with goats you know that goat cheese is perfumed with the scent of a goat. The feral/grassy aroma can curdle (no pun intended) someones stomach. But how do beets and goat cheese chemically fuse together to make such an iconic duo.

Potentially the combo upends the notion of “two wrongs don’t make a right,” it might be more complex than that. In France’s Loire Valley, Sancerre is paired with various goat cheeses. Famously “Crottin de Chavignol” (which hails from one of the best regions for growing Sancerre) is a small turd-like goat cheese fudgy in texture and tangy throughout. Crottin in French literally translates to poop, so there’s that.

Beets and tarragon, beets and horseradish or beets and dill have a natural affinity between one another, but beets and goat cheese are a harder sell. The sauvage-nature of beets and goat cheese offer a primal gateway back to our roots. Sweet terrior richness is coerced out of each of the ingredients. The beets and goat cheese enable each others best qualities. The entanglement has potential to be a complete disaster, although rarely the case.

What I love about the oddest pairings is how undeniable they can be. Gathered on the plate together beets and goat cheese just sing. Theres a Nina Simone quality to their relationship embodied with emotion and gut. I often feel when something just works, it doesn’t require much explanation at all, it just is.