Southend-on-Sea in Transition

Seasonal vegetables for roasting, originally uploaded by Transition Town Westcliff.

This is a post-festive meal made up of seasonal vegetables obtained from the Milton Community Partnership’s veggie box project run by Eleanor King. The main part of the meal consists almost entirely of root vegetables that could be grown locally, ie, in your garden or allotment. The topping I have to admit was made from shop bought produce, but again could be grown during the summer months or under glass and either preserved or frozen… It was cooked in our wood fueled Rayburn, using locally sourced seasoned timber…

One large red onion

2 medium parsnips

4 medium carrots

2 large beetroots

One large sweet potato

5 or six medium potatoes

A bulb of garlic

Fair Trade Olive Oil

Topping;

Several chopped tomatoes

Several chopped mushrooms

A large red pepper

Cut root vegetables and onion into largish chunks or cubes. Line them on the base of a good quality baking tray and drizzle with olive oil. Break garlic into cloves and place amongst the veg. Don’t worry about peeling the cloves, the insides will soften as they cook and the garlic skins can be discarded afterwards. Roast in a hot oven for an hour or so until the vegetables are beginning to soften. Remove from oven and top with the chopped tomatoes, mushrooms and pepper and replace in the oven for another 30 – 45 minutes or so.

Serve with a nut roast (or in our case a curried bean loaf made from mashed broad beans (frozen produce from the allotment last spring), grated carrot, oats and cooked rice (not locally grown I’m afraid…), gravy or whatever you fancy… This fed our family of 6 with plenty left over for tomorrow’s lunch…

Submitted by Graham Burnett

Filed under: Awareness Raising, Food, Local, transition westcliff, Uncategorized |