Roasted Root Vegetables are Delicious!

I am a vegetable loving gal.  I eat a little meat, but side dishes are my preference.  This lovely dish of roasted winter vegetables was served for Thanksgiving and it was delicious!!  Our son in love Todd made the turkey and stuffing and I baked a ham, made all the sides and deserts.  Needless to say, we had a true Thanksgiving feast.  This was probably my favorite dish on the buffet of 15 sides and deserts I prepared.  

This is an easy recipe and you can choose any of your favorite vegetables to roast.  The hardest part is cutting them all up, the roasting part is easy.  Here is what I used:

Turnips

Butternut Squash

Brussels Sprouts

Baby Bella Mushrooms

Zucchini

Onions

You will also need a few cloves of garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper and a few big sprigs of rosemary.  You will also need a large baking sheet with sides.

Cut all the vegetables into similar sized pieces so that they will cook at about the same time.  Cut the Brussels sprouts in half and the onions in half and then into eighths.   Spray the baking sheet lightly with cooking spray.  Places all the vegetables in a bowl and drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper and mix with your hands making sure all vegetables are coated.  Place the coated vegetables on the baking sheet.  Place several unpeeled cloves of garlic on the vegetables in various places and lay two large sprigs of rosemary on the top of the vegetables.  It should look like this.  The garlic and rosemary just lightly perfume the vegetables and give them a wonderful flavor.

Lightly drizzle some more olive oil over the top and put in the oven at 350 degrees until vegetables are soft.  It took about 30 minutes. 

Roasting brings out the sweetness in the vegetables and they reheat beautifully if they are not all consumed at one meal.  I would have used some beets also, but I could not find any.  Beets are best pickled or roasted.  You can use as many vegetables in any amount you want to make this dish.  Needless to say, I made a huge amount for all the people we were serving.  Either way, they are so very good to eat!

I hope you will try this easy and delicious method of making roasted vegetables.  It is a true winter delight.  Enjoy!

Everyday Donna

Things to Remember:

An onion can make people cry, but there has never been a vegetable invented to make them laugh.  ~Will Rogers

Bountiful Fall Harvest

The Nashville Farmer's Market is where we do the bulk of our food shopping these days.  Why?  First, we support local growers and appreciate their effort and the quality of food they provide us.  We want to know that will continue, so we give them our money in exchange for their excellent products.  Secondly, it is always an adventure.  There is always something new to see or explore.  Third, it means there will be some recipe forthcoming to make our dining experience worth the effort.

I thought I would show you some of the fall products available at the market right now and then share a recipe I made using butternut squash.  Did I take a picture of the butternut squash or the stand where I purchased it?  No, I forgot.  Silly me.  But, I did capture the beauty of the fall mums and pumpkins.  You can even see the state capital in the corner of one picture.  The Farmer's Market is not far from downtown.  It is quite large, has a wonderful variety of fresh produce and locally grown meat - beef, pork, chicken and lamb which is grass fed and hormone and antibiotic free.   There is  also a food court offering a wide variety of international cuisines.  The Jamaican restaurant, Jamaican Way, has been featured on Diner's, Drive Ins and Dives on the Food Network.  It's worth a trip just to enjoy some of the food.  There is also a large Indian market that offers a huge variety of spices and products.  And, there is a really nice nursery offering all sort of flowers, shrubs and lawn decorations.  I can spend a lot of time checking out all the beautiful flowers and I usually come home with something lovely.

Here are just some of the fall pumpkins available.  It is so hard to pick out just a couple to bring home when they are all so beautiful and interesting.

I love the way the sunlight plays on the pumpkins in these pictures.

If you look to the center of this picture, you can see the Tennessee state capital sitting grandly upon the hill.  It is quite a distance from the Farmer's Market but looks lovely on this sunny day.

This poor pumpkin looks like he needs to see the dermatologist.  There are so many interesting varieties of pumpkins and gourds - some quite beautiful, others quite prehistoric looking.  Isn't nature amazing?

Don't you love the leaning towers of pumpkins?  How cute would these be decorated on your front porch?  Or, you could just stack them like this.  They are so interesting and varied.  I could spend hours  looking at all the varieties.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures from the Farmer's Market.  Just thought I'd share them with you.  We had a lovely afternoon there with our "besties" while they were visiting.

My BFF Tonya loves butternut squash, so I purchased some while we were at the market.  I will tell you it is NOT easy to peel, but hopefully this will help you.  Butternut squash has a very hard "shell" like pumpkin.  It can be split and baked, but it had to be peeled for this recipe.  Hopefully, this will make it a little easier for you.  Using a chef's knife, I cut off the top and bottom ends.  The squash has a thick neck and a round bottom with a definite separation between the two.  Cut between the neck and the round bottom.  Next, peel the neck with a sharp knife or heavy-duty vegetable peeler, then peel the round bottom.  Cut the bottom in half and remove the seeds and pith.  Cut the neck in half.  Lay the cut sides down and cut long strips and then cut crosswise so that you have about 1 to 2 inches squares.  Do the same the with round bottom pieces.

Spray a casserole dish with cooking spray.  I used two squash for this recipe to serve 8 to 10 people.  Lightly salt and pepper the squash and place it in the casserole dish.  Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil, then drizzle with honey.  I used about two handsful of brown sugar and crumbled it over the squash.  Next, I took about 3 big sprigs of fresh rosemary and stripped the needles from the stems and minced it.  Sprinkle the rosemary over the squash.  You can used dried rosemary if you do not have fresh. ( Let me say, I am going to miss my herb garden terribly this winter.  I think I may have to put some of my favorite herbs in pots and keep them in a sunny window in our sun room.)   Place the casserole in the oven at 350 and cook until the squash is soft.  It is really delicious and makes a wonderful fall side dish.  Next time, I am going to try this same recipe with sweet potatoes because I think it would be just as good and sweet potatoes are a whole lot easier to peel!

Hope you enjoyed the pictures and that you will try this really delicious recipe now that the days are cooler and there are definite signs that winter is on the way.  I will miss all the summer and fall beauty of the farmer's market and all the fabulous summer produce, but we will continue to shop there all through the winter trying whatever local things are available.  Am I looking forward to cold weather?  Not at all!  But, it's part of living isn't it?  Now, it's time to start sewing on all those Halloween costumes I have to make.  Catch you later.

Everyday Donna

Things to Remember:

“Living up to an image that you have of yourself or that other people have of you is inauthentic living.”
― Eckhart Tolle,