What is it about veggies that most of us just don’t want to eat them? I say its bad memories. Its the memory of the soggy broccoli you had at a restaurant or the canned vegetables your mother made you eat for dinner. The truth is that most people sabotage vegetables. Its not the vegetable…its the preparation. Boiling and over steaming are probably the biggest culprits.

But when you decide that you have to make vegetables the biggest part of your daily diet…you better find a way to enjoy them or you’re in big trouble. We have definitely found a cooking method that works:

ROASTING 

The recipe we are about to share with you is the most basic, embarrassingly simple way to cook almost any vegetable and LOVE it.

Here’s what you do:

Take Asparagus for example:

• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees
• drizzle olive oil and some salt on asparagus (Trim an inch from the bottom)
• toss in a bowl
• lay flat on top of parchment paper or aluminum foil on a baking sheet
• cook for 30 minutes (time may vary depending on vegetable and your oven. You need to be vigilant the first few times you make the vegetables so you can note the time that is right for you. You don’t want to overcook the vegetable but you also don’t want it to be too hard)

THAT’S IT.

Other veggies you can try this method with include:

• butternut squash
• sweet potato
• parsnip (trim an inch off the bottom)
• green beans (trim off the ends)
• brussel sprouts
• cauliflower
• carrots
• beets
• zucchini
• squash
• red and green peppers
• garlic (to use in soups and other recipes…yummy)

This cooking method has allowed us to start this love affair with vegetables. Caveat: We don’t like using this method on broccoli because we find it to be too dry. We will post another recipe for broccoli, but we encourage you to try any and all of these veggies using this simple recipe.

What’s so great about this recipe is that you don’t need fancy ingredients or techniques and you don’t have to be a great cook to pull this off. Even I can cook this and I rely entirely on my husband to do the cooking.

We usually use this method at dinner time and we tend to make a large portion. We love leftovers because our kids go to sleep so early that they won’t enjoy this veggie until the next day.  We also sometimes double up on the veggies…for example we’ll make roasted butternut squash and green beans and use the squash as the carb.

But another great little perk is that I incorporate the leftovers in my meals the next day.

For example: My absolute favorite is to have the roasted butternut squash in my fridge for a few days to put in my salads. It is DELICIOUS! I also snack on it if I’m hungry and I need a snack. I just heat it up and eat a few bites and its filling and healthy.

If we have left over red beets I also put it in our salads the next day, but sometimes I make a beet smoothie in the morning.

We try to make our morning and afternoon vegetables RAW because that is the way you get the most vitamins and minerals from the vegetable. But it is nice to throw in a cooked vegetable into your salad every once in a while and keep it interesting.

We hope you’ll put this recipe to the test this week and try as many vegetables as you dare!!!

GOOD LUCK AND REMEMBER…PILE ON THE GREENS!!!