A beet is a dark red or purple root vegetable that grows underground, with leafy green tops that stick up above the soil. When you pull a beet from the garden, it looks like a round bulb with a long root dangling below and green leaves sprouting from the top.

Beets have an earthy, slightly sweet flavor that some people love and others find too strong. They're famous for staining everything they touch a deep magenta color: your fingers, your cutting board, even your tongue if you eat enough of them. Chefs roast beets, pickle them, add them to salads, or blend them into smoothies. In Eastern European cooking, beets are the star ingredient in borscht, a traditional soup.

The phrase red as a beet describes someone whose face has turned bright red, usually from embarrassment, anger, or hard exercise. After running several laps around the playground on a hot day, you might be red as a beet.