A colorful root vegetable salad. (Photo: Lindley Thornburg)

Dish of the week: Fall root vegetables
Where to get it: Del Campo, Macon Bistro, Columbia Room, The Lafayette, Requin, Service Bar

Colors of the wind? Nah, colors of the earth. Cool-season veggies are much more vibrant than the sad brown potato. They’re a riotous rainbow. Just look at beets and carrots. And while these good-for-you goodies might not have the hip factor of some hot new thing in the summer, plenty of restaurants are upping the creativity to bring sexy back to the root vegetable.

First up, the beet. It is perhaps the star of the pretty root vegetables, with its pleasant sweet flavor and royal hues. But roasting a beet and throwing it on arugula does not make a dish exciting. For something exciting, Del Campo (777 I St., NW) brings the campfire to the plate, making its burnt beets salad, featuring charred beets tossed with endive, smoked yogurt, and topped with beet chips and a burnt-beet vinaigrette.

The beet’s earthy sweetness also naturally lends itself to a dessert-style dish, which is why Macon Bistro and Larder (5520 Connecticut Ave, NW) creates a towering beet Napoleon of goat cheese mousse and a roasted beet slice sandwiched between puff pastry and drizzled with honey and beet vinaigrette. And at Columbia Room (124 Blagden Alley, NW), beets get a touch of whimsy. They’re pickled and set next to a fluffy steamed bun and a hearty, wintry smoked egg.

Marrying beets and carrots together is the Lafayette in the Hay Adams (800 16th St., NW). Carrots, beets, and fennel (all locally sourced) are plated to evoke a wild fall garden, sharing space with Vermont goat cheese and a sprinkling of microgreens.

Creamy, warming soups are a popular way to make carrots hot again. Catch one with some complexity at Requin (8296 Glass Alley, #110, Fairfax), which spoons out a roasted carrot and fennel soup, deepened with nutmeg and topped with another root veggie, crispy leeks.

Don’t think we’d let you out of here without something to knock all that back with. The creative, drink-centric minds at the newly opened Service Bar (926-928 U St. NW) are pouring a seasonal heirloom carrot margarita, featuring local tri-color (orange, yellow, and purple) heirloom carrots. The veggies add a playful lightness to counter the potency of the tequila—and the drink’s color changes with every batch.

So while summer produce is gone, it’s hard to beat these winter veggies.