11/10/14

Tsimmes


Photo is a screenshot from this video on the Food Network.



The November 11 farmshare from Glade Road Growing is slated to include  sweet potatoes, roasting radish, rutabaga, turnips, fennel, and napa cabbage.  Sally asked for something for folks who don't much like turnips.

I'm guessing some find the taste too sharp when they're raw; roasting will make them taste milder.  You can make them milder yet, if you cook them with veggies with more natural sugar, such as this week's sweet potatoes and/or carrots, onions and beets.  You can even add a bit of honey or sugar and/or dried fruit.

All this brings me to a recipe from the Jewish tradition, tsimmes, which is a sweetened combination of vegetables (or of meat and vegetables), which has been stewed, roasted  or baked.  Joan Nathan has a bunch of great recipes, which inspired mine for this week.

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Serves 8

1.  Wash and halve, a sweet potato, roasting radish and  rutabaga.  Wash, and trim turnips and fennel of root end and any greens.  (Reserve the greens for another use.)

2.   Peel and halve 2 onions.  I also like to use 2 tart apples, 4 carrots,  and one beet.

3.  Roast (cut side up, if applicable) for half an hour at 450 degrees F in convection oven or or wrapped in aluminum foil on a cookie sheet in a conventional oven.

4.  Cool enough to handle and remove skin from sweet potatoes, radish, rutabaga and turnips.  Chop all the veggies and apples into large pieces.  Boil 2 cups of water with 2 TB honey or demerara sugar.  Add roasted veggies and apples and return to a boil, then reduce to simmer. Stir in 2 TB of orange juice concentrate and 1 TB of butter or extra virgin olive oil  and cook until softened and the flavors combine.

5.  Serve warm, topped with toasted walnuts.

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Or if you like turnips just fine raw, you can make a nice shaved salad of the turnips, fennel, radish, carrots and nappa cabbage.