Roasted Roots

Earlier this fall I took the grandbabies out to my friend Ulrike's place for pumpkins and a hug, and she gave me some of her husband's turnips that he raises to feed the deer that show up in their back forty. (They are both wonderful craftspeople, she with her pressed flower creations and he makes the most beautiful collector quality bows for hunters.)
Wow! You should see her herb garden! A huge garden with sturdy picket fences surrounding it, the herbs she loves mixed with the flowers she presses, and all in raised beds to keep it German neat and tidy.
But I'm always wandering off... back to the turnips. What to do with turnips? I'm used to roasting potatoes but I got a couple of new vegetable-based cookbooks this summer and Pat has been supplying recipes with the CSA veggies... so somewhere along the line I got the idea to roast a mixture of other root veggies along with the potatoes, a roasted root veggie melange so to speak. The mixture of sweet and pungent roots, roasted together, is delicious!
Here's the general recipe:

ROASTED ROOTS
Wash and dry veggies (and trim if needed): I used turnips, Jerusalem artichokes, potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots. Parsnips would be nice too. Dice the veggie roots into cubes.
Place veggies in oiled pan (half sunflower and half olive is nice), sprinkle with good salt and fresh ground black pepper, and your choice of herbs (rosemary, thyme, oregano, savory) and toss to coat lightly.
Roast at 400 degrees, tossing every 15 minutes or so, until golden browned. (At least an hour, depending on the size of your dices.) Do twice what you need and the next day you can quickly reheat the leftovers in a non-stick pan. The leftovers could easily go into a soup or stew as well.
Easy and good for you!

UPDATE:
I went back and read this recipe again for some reason, and Yikes! I forgot the garlic! Add about 5 fresh crushed and chopped cloves of garlic to the veggies and toss them in the oiled pan. How could I have forgotten one of my very favorite veggies? Sorry.

Sunflower Soup Casserole

Remember the sunflower soup I wrote about? Well, I was out in the herb garden trying to get a handle on the maintenance while the weather is still good, and upon yanking the Jerusalem artichokes that grew under the fence I was surprised by how big they are this year. So 2007 was a banner year for Jerusalem artichokes, who knew?


I got a bucket full in no time at all and brought them indoors, trimmed and washed them, and popped the smaller ones unpeeled into the pot of chicken stock I had simmering on the stove.
(Do you make chicken broth? Store broth is Nothing like homemade. Mine is herbed and so rich it gels when cooled. And now we are getting our chickens from the farmer's market and I am not going back to factory farmed chicken, there is that much difference in chickens too.)

Kayla ate a few with her pasta that night. Without tasting them Herb thought they were new potatoes and that she'd choke, but they were soft and easy for her to swallow whole (that child does not chew!) but the texture when boiled is really too soft for adult enjoyment. We are not fans of soft boiled vegetables.
So what to do?
Then I remembered the Sunflower Soup recipe and tried it.
It turned out pretty good with the distinctive flavor of Jerusalem artichoke, but it was smooth and bland and frankly, beige, like eating chicken gravy.
Well I say, when you have gravy, make noodles!

My recipe
I added leftover cooked 'whole wheat' linguine to the Sunflower Soup, added some leftover chicken and some frozen peas, and it was delicious.
When I began to think about it, it is healthy as well. There is no fat (as in the fat in gravy) because I cooked the onion in the broth, and the thickening was all done by the blenderizing of the J. artichokes.



J. artichokes, by the way, have some amazing health benefits having to do with their chemical makeup not reacting with the insulin our bodies produce. I remember reading about native Americans, who as a group have a high risk for diabetes, when put on a diet of indigenous foods, suddenly experiencing weight loss and blood sugar corrections. (You can Google it.) The Jerusalem artichoke is a North American native plant.

If you are interested and want to try to grow a few Jerusalem artichokes, find a friend who has a patch - they seem to be one of those enthusiastic plants that produce enough progeny to be readily shared... or do what I did when I didn't know anyone who grew them. Go to the veggie department of your grocery store and pick up a package when they show up, and plant them in a sunny spot with room to grow (up - they are about 8 feet tall). You will have enough to share in no time at all.

And if you don't like the J. artichokes, healthy food or not, their native sunflower blossoms will be good for your soul.

And speaking of good for your soul, here is another shot of one of Pat's Brandywine tomatoes, probably the last fresh tomato of the year for us... ain't she a beauty?

We couldn't have asked for a better day

Our October landscape clean-up day at the grounds of the county Extension was lovely - that kind of crisp Autumn day in Michigan with sunny primary colors of blue and green, with beginnings of red and yellow that we all can imagine from calendar photos ...
But the companionship of nice people working together gave me a real boost ... better than a flu shot for the upcoming winter!

Carol and her daughter Mindy brought a cauldron of homemade chicken soup to warm on the grill and Vickie's Junior Master Gardeners added their cleaned and chopped freshly dug vegetables from their garden to the pot, and by noon or so we had a Harvest Soup feast. Delicious!

I brought home the cooking tip of adding Jerusalem artichokes to soups and stews, and to reciprocate, here is my recipe for the boursin-style herbed cheese spread that we ate on rosemary foccacia bread:

Herbed Boursin Cheese Spread

2 packages Philadelphia cream cheese
1 pound unsalted butter
1 clove garlic, crushed and minced
and a variety of fresh herbs, stems removed and leaves chopped:
baby chives, oregano, thyme, basil, 1 large sage leaf, 1 stem of rosemary
freshly ground black pepper

Beat the butter and cheese together until creamy, and stir in the herbs. Refrigerate overnight to meld flavors, and allow to come to room temperature before serving.

(By the way, for those of you with "inquiring minds", this is NOT a recipe I have ever served at home... it is what I call a "refreshment table" recipe, due to the cholesterol content. I figure adults can make choices even in buffet lines. You can make this cheese spread with low fat ingredients, but it just won't be the same.)

Finally, a note of public thanks to all the great volunteers who worked in the Backyard Herb Garden - you are all wonderful to contribute your time to this project and please know it is much appreciated. Thank you!

As soon as the ground thaws

I found this recipe for Sunflower Soup in the archives of KGI, Kitchen Gardeners International (link).
Link back to the original for a good article about Sunchokes, a.k.a. Jersalem Artichokes, a native sunflower with an edible root.
The photo is from Monticello's website. Thomas Jefferson noted the native plant.

My personal favorite use for Sunchokes is to braise/roast them along with other root veggies in the pan with a pot roast of beef. Sunchokes have a flavor all their own, and with pot roast gravy they are outstanding.

Sunflower Soup

Two types of Jerusalem Artichoke are available in France, one white and thin, the other round and pale pink. Either one will do but both discolour if exposed to air so cover with cold water or cook quickly after peeling.

Start off by peeling and chopping a large onion and sweating it gently in a covered cast iron pan with a knob of butter and a pinch of salt.
Meanwhile peel and chop a good handful of Jersusalem Artichokes and add them to the pan.
If you want a thicker soup, also add a diced medium-large potato.
Continue to gently cook the vegetables, without browning, for about 10 minutes.

Now add 1 liter of chicken stock (or vegetable stock, if you prefer).
A shake of white pepper, a small pinch of dried sage, bring the pan to the boil and then let the soup simmer for about half an hour.

Turn off the heat, allow the mixture to cool a little and then put it through the blender. Add a little water if you think the mixture is too thick. You should have a soup that is creamy in both colour and appearance.

Test the seasoning, add salt and white pepper if necessary, and reheat. Now you can stir in different finishing touches, for example: a soup spoon of double cream (highly recommended) or a tiny pinch of saffron.
This recipe makes 4 generous bowls of soup.
"Bon appetit!"
About the author, Gill Thompson, is a roving reporter for Kitchen Gardeners International. She lives in the Midi-Pyrénées region of France where she and her husband live in a charming sun-baked house with a lovely garden.