An embarrassment of riches...

The garden's exploded. There's food everywhere. As Marc and I filled our harvest bowls to the brim with green and purple beans, I couldn't help but giggle as I was reminded of that beautiful line from Casablanca that was made oh-so-much more entertaining when recited by Leslie Nielsen in The Naked Gun: "It's a topsy-turvy world, and maybe the problems of two people don't amount to a hill of beans... But this is OUR hill! And these are OUR beans!!"

*Sniff* Beautiful. So the beans were packaged up for another time, as the harvest also included the following:

Golden nugget, Kenosha, Black Russian, Black from Tula, Ottawa 39

Chantenay, Yellowstone and Cosmic Purple!

Chioggia and Touchstone Gold

The tomatoes were put aside for tasty sandwiches, a cherry tomato and bocconcini salad with basil (an oldie but unbeatable goodie - that's for din dins tomorrow with some nice baguette) and, of course, a ratatouille (as soon as Dad drops off another truckload of courgettes). So what was left? The beautiful, glorious root vegetables. I couldn't help myself; I had to create a tableau...:

Don't you just want to dive in?

Now, I think I've made it abundantly clear that turning on the oven when it's stinking hot outside goes against my deepest convictions. However, I had to make an exception. I just cringed at the thought of boiling all of this stuff for dinner... The time! The dishes! The lost flavour and nutrients! THE HUMANITY! 

So I lazily tossed everything together with olive oil and some leftover cauliflower I had hanging around the fridge, and I set that sugar-packed jewel box of a meal to roast. 

Peekaboo!

Oh, stop looking so good! You're embarrassing yourselves!

By the way, have you ever tried roasted cauliflower? Sorry for going off on a tangent here, but OMG. It's like eating buttery bits of sweet sweet caramelized and burnt goodness that could only be described as what a strapping young fireman's lips must taste like after a hard day's work of putting out five alarm blazes. Honest. It's mind blowing. But you have to be patient. They have to roast until they're soft enough that you can squish them between your fingers (hypothetically speaking, of course - don't burn yourself).

Woo! Is it getting hot in here? Right. My oven's on. 

Back to veggies. If you'd like to give roasted vegetables a go, I highly recommend it. Here are some  pointers:

1. No matter what the veggie (potatoes included), set your oven to 400 F and stick the baking sheet in there as the oven heats up; this will ensure that the sheet is searingly hot when the veggies hit it, which will help with caramelization (the delicious brown! The delicious brown!)

2. Cut all of your veg at the same thickness, so everything cooks at the same time. Keep into account the density of your veg as well - a cauliflower floret can be cut a lot bulkier than a slice of denser beet.

3. Make sure your veggies are nice and dry before you splash oil on them (you're just adding enough oil to coat them); a quick go with a tea towel usually does the trick. If they're still wet, the heat will be wasted on evaporation rather than caramelization. We don't want that.

4. Don't salt your veggies ahead of time; the salt draws out moisture and may slow or even - heaven forbid - prevent the delicious browning. Wait until they're done and salt them as soon as they come out of the oven, while they're still hot and glistening (like that fireman's lips). Pepper, herbs and/or spices are fine anytime, beginning or end.

5. Once your oven is at 400 F, pull out the pan and throw a good knob of butter in there - it should sizzle and slightly brown when it hits the hot surface. That's when you add your veggies and stick the pan back in the oven.

6. You can flip the veggies halfway through the cooking process, but I'm usually too lazy, so I rarely do. Forty minutes is a good cooking time, but I recommend you start checking for doneness as soon as 25 minutes in, depending on the type of veggie and thickness of the cut.

7. No matter what you're roasting, it's never a bad idea to add a thickly cut onion to the mix. Those are just awesome no matter what dish you're going to serve.

Once your veggies are roasted, you can do a ton of things with them:

- Serve them alongside some nice protein like fish, tofu or meat. 

- Mix them around with a grain like bulgur, millet or couscous, or some quinoa, throw in some herbs, some nuts, and give everything a splash of white wine vinegar and olive oil and - POOF! - you've got yourself a salad.

- Whizz them up with the stock of your choice (veggie, chicken, whatever) using an immersion blender, add some cream or plain yogurt if you're feeling naughty (full fat, please), and you've just made a roasted vegetable cream soup.

- Or stick'em between two slices of baguette or any other type of nice bread, with some goat cheese and some sprouts or microgreens (and maybe a slice of bacon if you're Marc) for an awesome sandwich.

By the time roasting was done, I just sprinkled some goat cheese on these particular veggies and served them as a main course with some lovely rosemary and garlic baguette from Art is In. If it hadn't been dark outside, I would have gone to the garden for an addition of freshly chopped parsley, but that was too much work.

The light was getting a bit low - sorry!

Voilà! See you next post!