How to cook beets in a bag in the microwave: cooking time, useful tips

2024 Author: Isabella Gilson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:14

Cooking beets in a saucepan is a very long process, so cooking a dish where you need to add this ingredient takes a huge amount of time. So instead, it's better to cook the beets in a bag in the microwave, spending about 10 minutes on it and making the cooking process much easier.

Beet preparation

First of all, if you want to quickly cook beets in the microwave in a bag, you should take care of preparing the vegetable for this process. After all, when we buy it or bring it from the garden, you can see adhering dirt on it, which will stain the package, and maybe the equipment itself. Therefore, before sending the root crop to the bag, it should be thoroughly washed with a brush, and then let it dry, since wet vegetables should not be placed in the microwave. And of course, it is better to choose vegetables of the same, small size, trying to ensure that the weight of one beet is about 150-200 grams, because otherwise, at the end of cooking, one root crop will be overcooked,and the other is still raw.

Beet bag

After you have washed the root crops, you can think about how to cook beets in the microwave in a bag. And the most important thing here is the stage of placing the vegetable in a baking dish. First of all, you can put the root crop only in a tight plastic bag or in a sleeve for baking in the oven.

So, having taken out the package, you should first tie it tightly with a sewing thread on one side. Then our washed and dried beets are placed there, and it is just as accurately tied on the opposite side. There is no need to add water to the bag. If you just took an ordinary tight bag, then, of course, it will need to be tied only on one side. After that, 2-3 punctures with a knife should be made in the container, and it will be possible to place it inside the unit.

Beetroot cooking time

However, before you start cooking, you need to find out how long it will take you to cook beets in a bag in the microwave without water. It turns out that it all depends on the power of technology. Most often, in microwave ovens, the maximum power is 700-850 watts. In this case, a medium-sized root crop will be cooked for 10 minutes, and a small one - about 5-7 minutes. However, if you are lucky and your appliances allow you to cook at a power of 1700-2500 W, then in this case you should not go far from the microwave, as the cooking time for beets here will be less than five minutes.

Vegetable cooking process

And here we arefinally, let's move on to figuring out how to quickly and easily cook beets in the microwave in a bag. So, having determined for yourself the time for boiling the root crop and placing it in the sleeve, you then need to put it on a refractory dish and set the timer for the calculated time, after which you can go to do other things.

During cooking, the bag will "inflate", become like a balloon, a vacuum will form inside it, and due to this, the beets will be cooked. As soon as the time is up, the microwave will turn off, the dish can be pulled out of it, the bag is carefully cut with a knife and the beets are left to cool. Well, after that, the only thing left to do is peel the beets and act according to the further instructions of the recipe for the dish you want to cook.

Cooking beets in the microwave for vinaigrette in a package

Separately, it is worth mentioning the preparation of a root vegetable for vinaigrette. As we know, for this dish, the beets will need to be boiled and cut into small cubes. Therefore, to simplify the task, you can slightly change the principle of preparing a vegetable for laying in a vinaigrette.

To do this, before cooking beets in the microwave in a bag, it will need to be not only thoroughly washed, but also cleaned and cut into thick rings. Only after that we put the root crop in a bag, tying its edges, as indicated earlier, put it on a refractory dish and put it in the microwave.

But due to the fact that we pre-cut the beets, we set the time on the technique equal to fiveminutes, we put the microwave oven at full power and set off to cut other ingredients. When the time is up, you will need to open the package, cool the beets, and then cut into cubes, as required by the salad recipe.

Cook a vegetable without a package

It happens that you decide to cook beets in a bag in the microwave, and then it turned out that you simply don’t have a tight package. However, this is not a reason to despair and take out the pan to cook the ingredient in the old grandfather way. You can cook the root crop without a package, in any refractory container with a lid.

First of all, as in the case of cooking in a bag, you need to thoroughly wash the beets, and then put them in a saucepan that can be put in the microwave. Then we add water to the container so that it covers its bottom by 1 cm, close it with a lid and send it to the microwave oven. Next, set the equipment timer for 10 minutes, turn on the microwave at full power, and then just wait for the result. In the end, as soon as the device turns off, all that remains is to get the beets, cool them and treat them as the recipe requires.

Second option for cooking beets without a package

There is another way to get out of the situation if it is not possible to cook beets in a bag in the microwave due to the lack of dense cellophane. In this case, we need a fireproof dish, a plastic lid and small wooden skewers.

Of course, firstyou should thoroughly wash the root crop, and then pierce each beet to the middle with a wooden skewer over the entire surface of the vegetable: from the bottom, top and sides, making about five punctures. After that, we put the vegetables on a dish suitable for placing in the microwave, and cover them with a plastic lid with an open valve.

Next, put the beets in the microwave, turn on the appliance at full power and set the timer for 10 minutes. After this time, the microwave oven will turn off, but the root crops must be allowed to stand there for another 3 minutes. And after that, the vegetables can already be taken out, cooled and then deal with them as required by the instructions.

Microwave replacement

But there are also cases when cooking beets in the microwave in a bag is also impossible due to the fact that you simply do not have this unit. First of all, for these purposes, you can use a multicooker. In order to cook a root crop in it, of course, it will first need to be thoroughly washed and cut in half. Then we put the vegetable in the bowl of the unit, fill it with water, select the "Bean" mode, set the timer for an hour and go about our business. After the allotted time, the beets will be ready. And if you need to prepare a vegetable for vinaigrette, you can peel and cut it into rings, and then set the timer for half an hour, which will save even more time.

Well, if you don’t have a multicooker, then in this case you will need an oven, where you can also cook beets. Naturally, as in the previous cases,first you have to thoroughly wash the vegetable, and then each beet separately will need to be wrapped in foil, leaving no gap. Next, turn on the oven, heat it to the maximum temperature, put the root vegetables there and set the timer for half an hour. After the allotted time, take out the beets, carefully remove the foil, cool the vegetable, and then you can safely cut it into a salad or any other dish.

Note to the hostess

And now you know exactly how to boil beets in the microwave in a bag. However, here it is also important to remember a few nuances of cooking root crops that will help you facilitate and simplify the process of cooking vegetables:

1. It is best to wash the beets before putting them in the bag with a brush or iron sponge, because in this case they will not only clean the dirt on the vegetable, but also reduce the thickness of its skin, so that the root crop will cook faster.
2. Removing the skin from the beets will be much easier if you place it under ice water before that, then the peel will literally lag behind the root crop by itself.
3. Before putting the beetroot in the bag, cut off its tail, otherwise it will cause the cellophane to tear.
4. After you take the beets out of the microwave oven, you should be very careful, because when you open it, you release very hot air from there. So be careful not to get burned.
5. Taking the vegetable out of the bag, stick a knife or a toothpick into it. If theywill freely pass into the pulp of the beet, which means that it is completely ready for use, and if not, then it must be placed in the microwave again for a couple of minutes.
6. According to the same principle as with beets, carrots and potatoes can also be cooked in a microwave oven, only in this case, their boiling time will be about 5-7 minutes.