A note on beets & aesthetics: maybe you're at the store, and they have a big bin of rainbow colored beets. Maybe you think, "I shall make a salad all the hues of the rainbow, excepting green & blue!" That is not how beets work. It'll be radiant for 2 minutes, but then the purple beets get on the yellow beets and turn them gray and sad and it's very disappointing. Stick with one color, if you can.
For the beet-haters, R once counted himself among you, but he likes this salad. Well, his words were, "I would probably like this if I weren't sick." Please take that ringing endorsement for what it's worth. This is basically a hybrid of this recipe and this recipe.
Recipe for Shredded Beet & Carrot Salad below the jump