Category — vegetables

If you haven’t given roasted vegetables a try you don’t know what you are missing! Not only do they taste great because roasting brings out the natural sweetness but you’ll love how quick and easy they are to prepare. All you need to do is a little advance planning.

Discover just how good vegetables can be!

That’s what I love about roasted vegetables. They’re easy to prepare if you have plenty of time for roasting or they can be prepared ahead of time and then simply reheated when you are ready to serve. This is particularly helpful midweek when time may be at a premium or you’re feeling tired and stressed after a long day of work.

You can roast just about any veggie but roasting works particularly well with root vegetables such as sweet potatoes, white potatoes, and carrots. However, you might also enjoy broccoli, summer squash, winter squash, brussel sprouts, mushrooms, green beans, asparagus, cauliflower and others.

Here’s what you need to do. First preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Then wash the vegetables and then cut them into even sized pieces. I like to cut bite size pieces because that makes them easy to eat. Depending on the size of something such as mushrooms they could be left whole.

You’ll also want to consider how fast the vegetables will cook. The heavier or denser root vegetables and winter squash may take longer to cook (depending on the size of the pieces) than say broccoli, summer squash, cauliflower, or brussel sprouts.

You could choose to cut the denser veggies such as the potatoes a bit smaller than the others. Or roast them on separate baking sheets and get the denser vegetables started first.

When all the vegetables are cut, toss them with a tablespoon or two of olive oil. Then sprinkle with some salt and pepper. Over time you can experiment with adding other seasonings.

Layer the olive oil coated veggies on a roasting pan in a single layer. Avoid having the veggies be too crowded. Having a little space around each piece allows for greater browning to occur. Total roasting time will be vary between 30 minutes and 1 hour depending on what you are cooking.

When the veggies are about half done (15-30 minutes) stir them well on the baking tray to redistribute and expose all sides to the heat. When the veggies begin to brown give them a taste to see how they are coming along. Some people like crispy roasted vegetables and others prefer just barely soft.

Easy don’t you think? Roasted vegetables can be enjoyed in a variety of ways. Serve them as a snack, as a side with a main dish, or let these veggies be a main dish in and of themselves when served over a whole grain such as whole wheat couscous, brown rice, or quinoa.

Sweet potatoes are nutritious and they can be delicious. They are a great source of carotenoids (such as beta-carotene an antioxidant and precursor of vitamin A), vitamin C, potassium, and dietary fiber.

All you need is a little bit of know-how to easily prepare a variety of sweet potato dishes. You can bake them, mash them, and then mix in some unsweetened applesauce or crushed pineapple for extra flavor, sweetness, and moisture. Or you might steam some chunks of peeled sweet potato until tender and then mash them up along with a little orange juice.

One of my favorite ways to prepare sweet potatoes is to make baked sweet potato fries. I’ve got a short video today to show you just how easy it can be to make your own baked fries.

Baking is the key to keeping the calorie count in a reasonable range. Even so you will want to go easy with the oil and limit your portion of fries. About 1/2 of a sweet potato is enough for a serving of these fries (about 130-150 calories) but you may find it hard to stop eating once you get started!

Experiment with your own seasonings till you find the mix you like best. See if you can come up with a good mix that limits the salt. Americans as a general rule get far too much salt in the diet.

Enjoy the baked sweet potato fries!