Bowl of Goodness: Roasted Veggies Over Rice

Sometimes simple really is best!  No need for a fancy marinade or complex procedures...just some good seasonal vegetables, roasted, with some brown rice and you have a colorful, flavorful, healthy meal!

Roasted Veggies.  They are just so versatile, beautiful, simple, tasty and healthy!  I love to roast a pan of summer vegetables.  I almost always make some kind of exclamation out loud as I am pouring them on the baking sheet to roast.  "Wow! Look at the colors!" or "Yum! It doesn't get any better than this!", or "Mmmm! This looks so good!"  Sometimes we make them with brown rice for a simple one-bowl dinner, or sometimes to go with pasta and tomato sauce.  We sometimes grill chicken to put with it - mostly to appease the males at my table.

The fun part is that you can use whatever vegetables you want.  Whatever you like, whatever you have on hand.  You can serve them as a side dish or with pasta, on rice, on polenta, couscous, as a main dish.  You can spice them up or keep them tame.  We love them topped with shredded parmesan cheese.  

It's a great way to serve a variety of veggies in one dish, where each one keeps its unique flavor but they are prepared together.  (And you can include the veggies that you know your eaters will like and they might even try another along the way.)

Prepare them with salt and pepper as seasoning (and garlic cloves and onions) and have additional seasoning/sauces available on the table.  In our house, the guys adore soy sauce.  I prefer a kick, like some Cholula hot sauce, or crushed red pepper or Sriracha (Thai hot sauce.)  And we all like cheese on top...parmesan, feta, cheddar or whatever you like.

  

Simply select your veggies.  I like to include: onion, garlic, bell peppers (all colors), asparagus, carrots, zucchini, and squash.  You can add fresh basil or other fresh herbs.
Clean and cut the vegetables into large pieces. 

Place in a bowl.  Drizzle with a thin stream of olive oil.  Toss to coat all vegetables.
Season with Kosher Salt and Freshly Ground Pepper (to taste).  (You can add other seasonings of choice at this point if you'd like...but they are yummy just the way they are). Dump onto a large pan lightly sprayed with cooking oil - spread evenly in one layer.  

Dinner is served!

Cook in a HOT oven (400 degrees) and after 15 minutes or so, use a large metal spatula to gently flip the veggies around.   Continue to cook for another 10 minutes or so.

When veggies are tender yet have a golden exterior, remove from oven and they are ready to eat!

I especially like them with brown rice.

Brown rice is prepared just the same as white long grain rice; it just takes much longer to cook (about 45 minutes).  You can put the rice on the stove and while it is cooking, you have time to prep and roast the veggies to go with it! 

My bowl of goodness


Here's to summer and dinner with roasted vegetables as the main attraction!