Cooking From the Pantry--Roasted Root Vegetables

As a Southern girl, born and bred, and a bit of a country girl, to boot, I grew up with home grown vegetables.  Purple hull peas, sweet corn, summer squash, tomatoes, cucumbers, green beans, just to name a few.  But a parsnip was not among them.  Up until recently I had never even seen a parsnip to my knowledge, and if I ever did, I probably thought it was some kind weird albino carrot.

But I've been trying really hard lately to broaden our vegetable horizons--so much so, that my son has even taken to trying a vegetarian diet for a while.  We've been eating kale, brussels sprouts, and baby carrots and sweet potatoes, too.

So as I was browsing the produce section, I came upon a bag of parsnips, and since we've had so much luck trying other new-to-us veggies, I decided to try these as well.  And yes, they do look like albino carrots!

I decided to try them a part of a pan of roasted root vegetables.  I had four small yukon gold potatoes, and this ginormous carrot that the husband of a friend brought back from his rounds of truck farms in West Texas and New Mexico.  I ended up with two of them, one of which I used in a pot roast a while back, and then this last lone one. 

It's that time of year, when the winter root vegetables are playing out, and the early spring greens haven't started producing yet.  So what do you do when you have a little bit of this and little bit of that in your fridge and/or pantry?  You but them all together with the simplest of seasonings, and you make the most amazing vegetable medley ever!

Ingredients:

• potatoes
• carrots
• parsnips
• olive oil
• kosher salt or sea salt

Peel or scrape the carrots and parsnips, and cut into chunks, splitting the larger sections into half or quarters lengthwise. Cut the potatoes into halves and then quarter the halves.  Drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with coarse salt.

 

Bake 30-40 minutes at 350-375, until fork tender and they start to brown. (I baked these 20 minutes at 350, then bumped the oven temperature up to 375 and cooked them another 15 minutes)

I love the mixture of these three together--the parsnips get really sweet, the carrots not quite as sweet, and then the potatoes balance it all out. 

Now that I've made the acquaintance of parsnips, I hope to maintain the relationship--I'm looking forward to fall planting time so I can see if I can grow my own in our garden next winter.  Maybe this time next year it'll be my own home-grown version that I'm using up from the pantry!

Until next time, good cooking, and good eating!

This post is linked to:

Frugal Food Thursday at Frugal Follies

Foodie Friday at Rattlebridge Farm

Friday Favorites at Simply Sweet Home

Foodtastic Fridays at Not Your Ordinary Recipes

Meatless Monday at My Sweet and Savory

See Ya in the Gumbo from Ms enPlace