Roasted Vegetables: Beets, Potatoes and Zucchini

 I know it's really hot outside, but if you can deal with it, you need to make some roasted vegetables. There are many great choices at the farmer's markets right now:  beets, potatoes, zucchini.

 The best part is, that once you make it through the roasting, you'll have plenty leftover for upcoming meals. You can serve these veggies as part of a green salad, as a pizza topping, or just on their own, cold with some salt and pepper.

Roasted Vegetables: Beets, Potatoes and Zucchini

You can cook all the veggies at once, but I prefer to do them individually so that they each keep their own flavor.

Ingredients:

• 4 to 6 zucchini sliced into rounds
• 8 to 10 beets, peeled and cut into chunks
• 10 yukon gold potatoes sliced into rounds
• 3/4 cup olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees and place an empty jelly roll pan in to heat up at the same time.
2. Once the oven has preheated, carefully remove the tray from the oven, pour 1/4 cup of the olive oil onto the tray and place the zucchini on top.
3. Turn the zucchini slices over several times to coat in the oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
4. Cook for 15 to 20 minutes, until the pieces have browned and softened.
5. Repeat this process with the beets and the potatoes.

Veggies in the Oven: Cauliflower Gratin and Roasted Asparagus

 These two vegetable dishes are super easy to make and can be used as either a side dish or with some small additions, as a main dish. The roasted asparagus can be served with pasta and a poached egg, as a main dish. If you like, you can add bacon to the cauliflower gratin to make it just that much heartier.

Featured on The Fruit Guys website, here and here.

Cauliflower Gratin

Ingredients

• 1 head cauliflower, cut into florets, steamed for five minutes
• ¼ cup breadcrumbs (regular or Glutino gluten-free)
• ¼ cup grated Parmesan
• Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
2. Put the cauliflower into a casserole dish. Cover with breadcrumbs, grated Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper.
3. Bake for 20 minutes, until the breadcrumbs are browned and cheese is melted.

Roasted Asparagus

Ingredients

• 1 bunch asparagus stalks, bottoms trimmed off
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 450.
2. Place asparagus on a rimmed baking sheet and pour olive oil evenly over the top. Turn the asparagus over a few times to coat all sides in the olive oil.
3. Roast in the oven for 20 minutes, until the stalks become browned and wilted.

I Love Chips...Oven-Baked!

As seen on The Fruit Guys website.

We love chips.

As I've mentioned before, I don't deep-fry foods very often. My fear is that I'll end up deep-frying everything, including candy bars at all hours of the day and night. Because of this homemade chips were seemingly out of my repertoire of dishes.

At about age two, my daughter Isabella was ready to eat all sorts of foods. I knew I had one shot at getting her to love all manner of root veggies. I chose oven-frying as my cooking method. As one of my sisters said "sure, you can get a kid to eat cardboard if you put some olive oil and salt on it and roast it until it's crispy."

She was right.

Isabella eats all manner of root veggies, prepared in any number of ways. She loves a good roasted veggie, especially brussels sprouts and sweet potatoes.

Oven-Baked Potato  Chips

This recipe will work for any root veggie: potatoes, brussels sprouts, sunchokes or carrots. 

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 5 to 6 potatoes
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
• Thoroughly scrub the potatoes to remove any grit.
• Slice the potatoes into thin even slices.
• Pour the olive oil onto a baking sheet.
• Place the potato slices on the oiled sheet. Mix them around to coat all of the slices evenly with the oil.
• Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
• Cook in the oven for 15 minutes.
• They are done when the chips turn a nice golden brown.

Cook’s note:  To slice the potatoes you can use either a mandolin slicer or the slicer blade on your food processor. And, cutting them by hand is perfectly fine, just make them as thin as possible and make sure the chips are about the same thickness to avoid burning.

The Jam Continues On

My friend and I did some more canning this past weekend. Ms. S is a lovely lady from Minnesota with a grandma in Iowa who taught her about all things preserved. I am not much of a measurer (ala Gran Fran), Ms. S measures everything to a T.

Needless to say, our jam session was interesting, what with me just chucking all sorts of stuff in my pot, and her making sure to follow her grandma's instructions to the letter. Of course, Ms. S ended up with a lovely and perfect batch of strawberry jam, which was perfectly set and tasted great.

I ended up with more of a chunky sauce, best to accompany meats. It's not that mine tastes bad, on the contrary, it tastes great. But, it's really hard to classify it. The ingredients are simple enough: oranges, figs, sugar, water, pectin, sage and cinnamon. The end result is really flavorful, just not necessarily for spreading on one's toast.

Mostly, I'm here to boast about how I used my first jar. By spreading it over a pork loin, that was placed atop carrots and new potatoes for roasting.  The jam melted into a wonderful sauce. It coated all the veggies and gave the pork a really nice sheen, not to mention the contrast of the sweet orange flavor with the meat.

The greatest part about working with Ms. S, was how we each approached our projects with such different attitudes. We acknowledged that though each of us had her own way, we could totally see the benefit to each of our methods. It's nice to find someone who is different from you, but who gets you so completely.

The recipe that follows is just for the pork loin. I want to refine the chutney recipe a bit more before I post it officially, so, for now, I will recommend that you use a nice orange marmalade instead.

Pork Loin, Carrots and Potatoes with Orange Jam


Ingredients

• 2 pounds Pork Loin
• 8-10 New or Fingerling Potatoes cut into quarters
• 2 large Carrots, cut into 1/4 inch chunks
• 3 sprigs fresh Sage, chopped coarsley
• 1/4 cup Orange Marmalade
• Oil for searing the meat
• Salt and Pepper to Taste

Method

• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
• Place a heavy-bottomed non-reactive oven proof pan on the stove over medium-high heat. When it is heated well, add olive oil to coat the bottom.
• Put the pork loin in the hot pan and sear on both sides, about 4 to 5 minutes per side.
• Once the meat is seared, pick it up with tongs and put the potatoes and carrots beneath in the pan, then put the pork on top of the veggies.
• Spread the marmalade, jam or whatever saucy goodness you are using over the meat, making sure to coat it thoroughly. It's also nice to get some of it on the veggies, so they get a little crispy and sweet while they cook.
• Sprinkle sage over the pork and add some salt and pepper.
• Place the pan in the pre-heated oven and cook for approximately 25 minutes.