roasted root vegetables

I've written other posts about cooking once and reaping the rewards for many meals to come. Roasted veggies are a prime example of this. While simple, roasting takes twenty minutes or more. (And on a school night, that 20 minutes may not be an option!) For example, you can't beat the crispy sweet taste of roasted broccoli straight from the oven. It's certainly best right then. But there are plenty of healthful dishes I may make in days to come that could use a quick toss in of a handful of this roasted broccoli (like a quesadilla, scrambled eggs or a frittata...) so I like to roast a giant batch, enjoy it that day and then package up my remaining veggies...which is exactly what I did with this big batch of roasted root veggies.

Simple Roasted Root Veggies (and Fennel this time!)

On one rimmed baking sheet, I roasted chunks of celery root and rutabaga. On the other, I tossed fennel, a variety of purple, red and yellow new potatoes and carrots. Both sheets were drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with some kosher salt. To roast them, I simply preheated the oven to 375, and popped them in for about 30-40 minutes, or until they were fork tender (meaning a fork poked into them easily), tossing them 2-3 times during the cook time.

That night, I served them as a side with a zesty rubbed pork tenderloin like the one in this post. I always keep a rub or two in my pantry, because it turns a regular pork tenderloin into a fabulous main dish like that. On this particular night, I roasted two rather large pork tenderloins.

After we'd had our fill, I packaged up the remaining root veggies and the second pork tenderloin. I want you to do the same, because we're going to turn both of them into something fabulous in the next post!