Here is another exercise in cleaning out the fridge and producing something hearty and wholesome. To be honest, it had a deliberate aspect because I decided to reserve certain ingredients for the salad instead of using them elsewhere.
The salad formed up in my imagination about three days before I wanted to serve it and I concocted it from a mixture of homegrown root vegetables and winter squashes plus broccoli, cauliflower, and celery. It is easy to get a little weary of rutabagacarrotonionbeetacornsquash this time of year, with or without cabbage. So I roast, sauté, boil, and grate, and repeat. Over and over. No wonder big, bright green heads of broccoli and the dense snowy cauliflowers look so appealing.
I really am a sucker for them this time of year before I have any new green stuff of my own growing, and even though I feel in my heart of hearts that it is very nearly unethical to be gulping down California’s scare water supply with my salad. After all, I know darn well that I am spoiled by being able to vary my diet so much despite my location. Only a hundred short years ago, Mainers got to wait at least another month or two before they tucked into fresh spinach, rhubarb, or some foraged dandelions.
Well, I will keep it down to a dull roar, re-concentrate on the frozen green beans, peas, and summer squash, and hope for a warming trend soon. Meanwhile, my big mixed salad brightened up one corner of the dining table with bright orange carrots both roasted and raw, buttery-yellow roasted rutabagas, bright green blanched broccoli florets, roasted cauliflower, nuggets of roasted garlic, and deep rust colored roasted acorn squash. Even though most of the vegetables were cooked, or at least blanched, the whole mélange was served at room temperature, with olive oil and rice vinegar, salt and pepper. Some parts were tender, others crunchy. If there had been any raw red peppers around, I would have tossed them in, too.
One more time: when in doubt, roast vegetables. When I was growing up, boil was the default mode and I am so grateful to have lived long enough to experience vegetable roasting. In this salad, carrots, rutabaga, cauliflower, and garlic dribbled with olive oil, all got the 425 degree treatment for about twenty minutes. The acorn squash was a leftover.
Meanwhile, I broke up broccoli florets and diced up broc stalks, blanched them for about a minute before chilling them. Blanching broccoli, green beans, and peas always improves the flavor, and turns them a bright green. I added another carrot or two, raw and diced, plus two ribs of celery sliced fairly thinly. I recommend a little finely chopped red onion. I could have added beets, particularly the golden ones I grew because they don’t bleed purple all over their neighbors the way traditional beets do. It looked pretty, tasted just fine. Vitamins and minerals, hurrah.
Don’t feel locked in by the list of ingredients. If you have leftover peas instead, or no cauliflower, please proceed unimpeded. Mix roasted and raw and it will be tasty and interesting.
- Carrots
- Rutabaga
- Turnips
- Winter Squash
- Cauliflower
- Garlic, to taste
- Broccoli
- Celery
- Red Onion
- Oil and vinegar
- Preheat the oven to 425.
- Peel, dice, or slice the root vegetables and squash to taste.
- Break up the cauliflower into bite sized florets, and dice the stalks.
- Peel the garlic cloves and leave whole.
- Spread vegetables in a roasting pan, and dribble with olive or vegetable oil, and roast for twenty minutes, turning them once.
- Break the broccoli into bites sized florets, and dice the stalks, blanch in boiling water for one minute, then take off the heat.
- Chop the celery and onion, and more carrot if desired.
- When the roasted vegetables are done, put them into a large bowl, let them cool, then add the rest of the vegetables.
- Sprinkle with vinegar and additional oil, remembering that the roasted vegetables already have oil on them.
- Salt and pepper to taste.
