Beetroot is an interesting crop in Minecraft. Initially starting as a crop that is only exclusive to Minecraft Bedrock edition for having been added in 2013, beetroot has since gained newfound popularity as one of the best crops in Minecraft Java Edition three years after. This makes beetroot one of the newest and easiest crops to access early in the game. And the fact it is a new addition to Minecraft Java Edition, planting them is the only usage of beetroot known to most players. However, there is more to beetroot than simply farming. This article will tackle what beetroot is, how to obtain one, and how you can use beetroot in the game.
What is Beetroot in Minecraft?
Beetroot is an item in Minecraft that is commonly used as a dye ingredient and food item. Like in real life, Beetroots are vegetable crops that players can mass-produce through farming. The player’s inventory can hold up to 64 beetroots in a single stack and multiple beetroot stacks.
How to Obtain Beetroot in Minecraft?
Beetroots are mainly obtained from harvesting a fully grown crop block from beetroot seeds. A fully grown beetroot crop will yield one beetroot and 1-4 beetroot seeds. These beetroot crops can grow in a village’s farm plot with farmer villagers attending to them. Depending on the percent chance of specific structures in the game, beetroots and beetroot seeds may be obtained as a loot inside chests.
How to Use Beetroot in Minecraft?
1. Beetroot used as a food
A beetroot’s main purpose in the game is as a food item for players to replenish their health and hunger points. Beetroots can easily be harvested from a fully grown beetroot crop block by breaking them with your bare hands or a tool. Once harvested, you can immediately consume the beetroot to restore one hunger point and 1.2 hunger saturation.
2. Beetroot used as a crafting ingredient
Beetroots can also be used as a crafting ingredient on a crafting table. When you place a single beetroot in the 3×3 crafting grid of the crafting table, you will obtain one red dye. But when you place one beetroot in all slots of the first and second rows of the crafting grid (for six beetroots used) and one bowl in the center slot of the bottom row, you will obtain one beetroot soup. Beetroot soups are great for replenishing hunger and hunger saturation points. However, they cannot be stacked in your inventory.
3. Beetroot used for breeding
Most players do not know this, but pigs can be bred using beetroot. The most common crop used for breeding pigs is carrots, but you can also use beetroot if carrots are unavailable. Pigs will also follow a player holding a beetroot in their hand, much like someone holding a carrot. Other than pigs, players can breed villager mobs using beetroot.
To breed a villager, the player must provide one villager with 12 beetroots to trigger the willingness of the villager to breed with another villager. You can give them beetroots by simply throwing the beetroot on the ground next to the villager and waiting for the villager to retrieve the item into its inventory.
4. Beetroot used for composting
Like most plant-based items and blocks in Minecraft, the beetroot can be used in a composter. Placing a beetroot in a composter allows the composter to raise its level by one but with a 65% chance of success. A full composter will turn the compost into a bone meal which you can use to hasten the growth rate of a single crop. Therefore, you can place any excess beetroots in your inventory into a composter to make good use of them instead of throwing them away.
5. Beetroot used for trading
Trading is a known tactic in Minecraft to obtain money—in this case, emeralds. Any excess beetroots you have can be traded with farmer villagers for an emerald. To be precise, novice farmer villagers can trade you one emerald for 15 beetroots. However, the trade offers of the trading menu of a farmer villager will purely be by chance, so you may or may not be able to trade one with beetroots depending on the success rate. In Minecraft Java Edition, there is a 40% chance that a farmer villager will trade beetroots for emeralds, and in Minecraft Bedrock Edition, there is only a 25% chance.