As you may know, I love to cook. I even make a “real” dinner for myself when I’m home alone. It makes me happy to do something I enjoy and knowing it is good for me too. I sometimes find it challenging to come up with original ways to prepare vegetables however, short of just steaming them or going online and skimming through other healthy lifestyle blogs for recipes. Yet the other day, I just chopped up all the (root) vegetables I had in the refrigerator and roasted them in the oven. The result was a brightly colored, slightly sweet, and nutritious base for at least 3 meals. Ideal to make ahead of time on the weekend so you can fix dinner quickly on weeknights.

A quick note about the nutritional value of root vegetables, as some people think they are less healthy than green leafy vegetables: root vegetables are truly natural, pure sources of complex carbohydrates, antioxidants and important nutrients such as vitamin A, vitamin C, potassium and magnesium. They are high in fiber and are low on the glycemic index. Because they are starchy and slightly sweet, they also help to fulfill “carb cravings” or a sweet tooth without filling your body with sugar and inflammatory refined grains. Therefore root vegetables are ideal to replace any grain and are an easy way to make a gluten free meal. For more detailed information on the nutritional value of root vegetables and their health benefits see for example Dr. Axe’s website. Lastly, I highly recommend eating only organic root vegetables, as these vegetables absorb their nutrients directly from the soil (and yes, you can have one glass or red wine with that!).

This is how I made it:

• 2 yellow beets
• 1 large sweet potato
• 1 large parsnip
• 5 carrots
• 1 fennel
• 1 large red onion
• All chopped into ½ inch / 1 cm cubes.

Put all chopped vegetables in a greased oven dish (I use coconut oil or olive oil) and mix with 2-3 tbsp. olive oil. Add some dried tarragon to taste. Roast in pre-heated oven at 400 °F/ 200 °C for 45 minutes, or until vegetables are soft. Turn the vegetables with a large spoon several times during the baking process to get them roasted evenly. Add salt and pepper to taste.

The first night I had the vegetables with a medium boiled egg and some avocado.

The second night I re-heated some of the leftover vegetables in a skillet, added 2 beaten eggs and turned it into a fromelet, which I ate with some steamed kale on the side. In the case you are wondering what a fromelet is: It’s a frittata turned into an omelet that got all fumbled up. It looks like this:

I’ll eat the final left-overs with grilled salmon and steamed broccoli. Let me know if you have any good and healthy vegetable recipes, because when my roasted vegetable batch is finished I will need more inspiration….