I have some soup cooking right now - instead of potatoes I cut up some yucca. I have never cooked with it before. Soup ingredients are: organic chicken/apple sausage, one can pinto beans. a yucca root, three carrots, one onion, some celery and hot sauce and soup stock.
Two nights ago a friend and I cooked up some heirloom winter squash and sausage, but the squash behaved like summer squash and sort of liquified in the oven. Still tasty, though.
I also have some beets and turnips, a bag each, I bought at a roadside farm stand a few days ago. Along with several other varieties of heirloom winter squashes. When I was at the grocery store today I mulled over celery root, fennel, spaghetti squash, beets, Jerusalem artichokes…
I know it’s easy to find recipes online and I have cooked with some of these more unusual vegetables before. But when I’m at the grocery store shopping on a whim I forget what recipes are good or tasty, and what in heck to do with them.
Any recipes or ideas for some of these unloved veggies? I love vegetables and enjoy experimenting with different recipes as long as they’re not too complicated.
I like fried yucca - think big starchy french fries, tender inside and golden brown outside - it’s commonly served by my relatives in Brazil, and when eating it down there I’ll often mash it a bit with a fork and spoon some beans (similar to pintos) over it.
I’m not sure if it maybe needs to be partially cooked (boiled) before putting it in the oil or not.
beets - wrap in foil and bake at 350 until soft-ish (beets don;t get really soft). Anywhere from 45 minutes for golf ball sized ones, to 90 minutes for baseball sized ones
turnips - so good in beef stew and shepherd’s pie. yum yum yum
winter squash - any kind, peel and toss with olive oil salt and pepper. roast at 350 for an hour or less, until softened. I usually cover for the first 30 -40 minutes
celery root - I haven’t cooked this myself but I loooove celery root puree in restaurants
fennel - slice, brush with oil and grill ; or chop, saute with onion and butter, then add stock and simmer until tender. Add salt if needed.
spaghetti squash - hate it. throw it away.
Jerusalem artichokes - another one I haven’t cooked myself, but I’ve had it pickled. Yummy and crispy.
Celery root (aka celereic) is so easy! I just cooked it for the first time.
First, use a sharp knife to cut away all the gnarled up skin and any greens, leaving nothing but with white flesh. it should look like a big peeled potato.
Then, cut it into cubes and boil it, just like you would potatoes, for around 20 minutes or until you can easily break up a chunk with a fork. (bigger cubes = longer cook time; smaller cubes = shorter cook time)
Strain off the cooking liquid, which can be used as vegetable base soup stock if you like. Mash the celery root just like you would mash potatoes (they are good mixed 50-50 with potatoes or plain on their own) season with salt, pepper, butter, etc.
Parsnips - use them like you would carrots, but they are much sweeter
Rutabaga (aka yellow turnip, swedish turnip, swede) - peel off the wax, treat like regular turnips, they have a stronger spicier flavor than turnips. One of my favorite - peel and dice, simmer with diced carrot until tender, drain, dress with butter and nutmeg
Watermelon radishes and black radishes - peel, dice, toss with oil salt & pepper, roast until tender
If you find you like beets, make sure to try chioggia and golden beets. Both have a milder flavor than red beets and lend themselves to raw preparations. I am not fond of red beets raw.
I had grilled nopales as part of my dinner last night. That was a new one for me. It seems to have just been peeled and grilled, although I think it would make sense to brush with olive oil and season with a coarse salt.
Think South American soups/stews such as Sancocho where yucca is integral and so delicious.
Link is just one example with chicken. Many others with fish, beef or just vegetables.
Just about any root vegetable ( turnip, parsnip, rutabaga, etc ) can be added to mashed potatoes to make them about a thousand times more interesting. I cut them into slices and saute in a bit of butter for ten minutes or so, until they carmelize a bit. Then add an equal amount of diced potatoes, and water/ broth enough to come up a little less than halfway ( low liquid is the path to good mashed taters ). Cover, let cook gently until everything is tender, them mash with a bit of cream or half and half or milk and butter & salt. Delicious! And more healthy than straight taters.
Yeah, I read that. It’s certainly verycommonly misspelled, though. In fact, googling yuca recipes just got me a correction from google and they showed yucca recipes instead.
I’m going to try mashed celery root, for sure. I pondered the nopales, too…I have eaten prickly pear in Mexico but recall being somewhat underwhelmed by it. Meiejers grocery stores - a midwest chain - usually has an excellent selection of unusual fruits and vegetables.
A friend of mine does a roasted winter vegetable medley, with different colored beets, carrots (including the sugary “black” carrots, turnips and so on. Hers turn out much better than mine for some reason.
I’ve made a fairly awesome salad with cooked red beets, now that I think about it. It involved feta cheese, oranges, balsalmic vinegar…shoot, can’t remember what else.
I believe that with squash, you sort of have to take it on a case by case basis. Even though the current market forces and agricultural corporo-fascist traditions of the last 100 years or so have convinced us there are only two squashes, acorn and butternut (people entirely forget the pumpkin as edible… tcomes from a can and is only for pie.), there are many squashes out there that have unique qualities and culinary properties and must be treated accordingly. If you are lucky enough to get them from a Fruit and Veg, produce, store then I would ask the monger for his suggestions.
Right now there is a sale on spaghetti squash at a fruit stand and it factored heavily into the Dr. McLean diet that I was on as a youngster, as it was basically substituted for any pasta (low carb) preparation. One simply steams boils or bakes the halved squash… Then you scoop out the perfectly pre-formed, ropy- texture, and straight-grained flesh. Kinda like bannana ropes. It does decently well with marinara, and butter and garlic. Probably be an interesting addition to a fettucini primavera (alfredo).
