Fresh vegetables are everywhere right now. Summer squash, cabbage, green beans, peppers sweet and hot, broccoli, tomatoes, beets, new potatoes, garlic, onions, corn, cukes, turnips . . . it’s happy high harvest season on the island and at your local produce stand. And what to do with all this bounty? Roast ’em.
Singing the praises of roasting veggies
- It’s a simple technique.
- It can be applied to dozens of different kinds of vegetables.
- You can do it in a toaster oven.
- It brings out the best in every vegetable. Delicious!
- It’s fast.
- It’s foolproof.
- Once you do it 3 or 4 times, it will become second nature for you.
The Process
- Prepare the particular vegetable by washing and drying (or shaking the water off of it), peeling if necessary, and chopping into fairly small pieces. (Don’t worry. There are lots of pictures to follow this explanation.)
- Put them in a pan and drizzle with a GOOD extra virgin olive oil. Dust with salt and pepper.
- Swirl them around in the pan to spread out the olive oil and coat the veggie pieces better.
- Put in toaster oven (or regular oven if you have a bigger pan and family) and roast at 425º for about 20 to 25 minutes. After about 15 minutes, remove the pan and stir and flip the veggies around a bit and put it back in until they’re “done.”
Some illustrations
Your basic tool besides a sharp knife or two and a cutting board is an oven. I live alone for now and use my trusty toaster oven. 
It’s pretty good sized and the pan that came with it, which you will see over and over, is about 9″ by 10″.
Then you need the three essential condiments:
- Extra Virgin Olive Oil. I don’t care what brand (though Spectrum and Trader Joe’s have some great ones). I buy what’s on sale before I run out and have the new bottle in the cupboard. My favorite is First Cold Press and organic. Whatever you buy for this should be a deep, flavorful green. It’s expensive compared to other oils, yes, but it’s a great value and it will make the quality of your food soar for a small investment. A little goes a long way.
- Salt . . . sea salt or kosher salt. These are real. The common, pourable “table salt” has other chemicals in it. Again, a little more expensive, but important for quality and health.
- Pepper . . . freshly ground. As in, you should have a pepper mill. I bought mine in the Dansk store in Copenhagen in 1970. It still works smoothly and gracefully. Always buy the best quality tool you can afford.
I’ve told you before that there are dozens of online movies and illustrations to show you how to clean an onion or mushroom and I don’t want to duplicate that. I want to get you thinking about preparing food in a “global” way rather than thinking that you need to follow a recipe.
Roasting veggies is a technique that can be applied in a bajillion ways. Here are some examples to whet your imagination.
In Spring, mid-April, asparagus is in season. Crimini mushrooms (baby portabellas), onions and cabbage are always available. Notice the olive oil drizzled on top.
I stuck this pan into the oven set at 425º.
After about 15 minutes I took it out. Notice that there is steam coming off of it (fresh veggies have a high water content). The cabbage has begun to turn brown around the edges and the mushrooms have shrunk a lot.
Then I stirred and flipped it a bit, and put the pan back into the oven.
About 10 minutes later I had roasted veggies.
Here are more before and after pictures . . .
Asparagus+criminis+cauliflower before
and after.
In May peppers were on sale for a dollar each. Before
and after.
Here are zucchini and broccoli.
still steaming . . .
Zucchini and green beans. Note the pepper. I was in a peppery mood that day.
One more combo: zucchini, cauliflower and red pepper.
Enough already!
. . . with the pictures. I have successfully roasted everything you see above plus carrots, eggplant, tomatoes, potatoes, turnips, sweet potatoes, black radish, and some I’m sure I’ve forgotten.
I started doing this only about a dozen years ago with potatoes, garlic and fresh rosemary and I fell in love with them. Because I’m basically a lazy cook, I eat roasted veggies 5 to 7 days a week as one of my meals.
If you don’t like canned or “boiled” vegetables, it’s a sign of your good taste. Now try these. I’m serious! If you’re still skeptical, start with the potatoes with big fresh garlic chunks or whole cloves and fresh rosemary if you have it. To die for . . .
I have to go. A gorgeous purple cauliflower is calling my name. She asked me to hook her up with the purple pole beans she met in the fridge. I’m throwing in a couple carrots to chaperone. ARE THESE THREE NOT GORGEOUS? 
In food, as in all things, beauty counts.
They’re quite large and lovely and we sometimes have them at my local grocery. Black on the outside, white on the inside and can be quite sharp tasting. I usually shred them with my little Japanese wonder-shredder and use them for crunch in a salad, but I had a half of one that needed using up one day so I cut it up and stuck it in with the other veggies du jour. It was quite nice.
I’ve not heard of black radish before
Good question Roscoe and I don’t know the answer. I’ve read probably 40 books about diet in the past 30 years. Not how to lose weight, but what’s the healthiest way to eat: Fit for Life, The Paleo Diet, Eat Right for Your [Blood] Type, The Total Health Cookbook, The Body Ecology Diet, etc. There’s a lot of agreement that raw fruits and veggies (and even meats) are best for us. Then Body Ecology says you shouldn’t eat raw cruciferous veggies (broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, e.g.). Others say avoid whole grains. Others say they’re essential. There’s food-combining, which my body likes, etc. In general, I know that fresh veggies are healthier, but they need to be consumed quickly after picking and they need to be grown with organic, or better yet, biodynamic methods.
It seems like you’re more conscious of healthy eating habits than most Americans. 90% of the money spent on food in this country is for processed foods. I’m starting by bringing awareness to what real food is and trying to make it appetizing and simple to prepare. I’d be happy if I could get 20 people out of the interior of the grocery store and into the perimeter of the store. (Well, happy for a short time. I have bigger goals but I’m starting gently. It’s that wily old teacher thing. Draw people in so gradually they don’t even know they’ve made major shifts in thinking by the end of the semester.)
Looks easy enough. Is there a significant loss of nutritional value with roasting versus raw? I like juicing them, but what important food components are you discarding with the leftover pulp after juicing?
Yum. I love veggies, and roasted is easy and delicious. I needed you to remind me though….this technique had half-slipped off my back burner.
I used to do my asparagus this way and then sprinkle them with a bit of balsamic and parmesan.