209. Roasted Vegetables

I absolutely love this dish in that it makes you forget that these are "only vegetables" and lets you savor their flavor as a dish in its own right. Deliciously savory with a tinge of caramelization.
But that doesn't go down with most Arabs. A meal without some form of meat is an incomplete one.

So this recipe functions for dual purposes wonderfully: first, I am perfectly content to make a bowl of these vegetables and have them as a meal by themselves. Secondly, if I were cooking for a family meal or guests, these roasted vegetables are complimentary to a roast something or another.
You may use what you have on hand, or get as creative as you want. I used carrots, onions, potato, courgettes, chickpeas, and garlic. You may add fennel, turnips, beetroots, celeriac, pumpkins, broccoli...

Ingredients:

potatoes
carrots
onions
courgettes
garlic
canned chickpeas
olive oil
salt & pepper
cumin, optional

Method:

Roughly cut all the vegetables: cube the potato, peel and slice the carrots, slice the courgettes,
peel and quarter the onion, separate the garlic into cloves, drain and rinse the chickpeas.
Mix all the vegetables together, season with salt, pepper, and the cumin if using.
Note that cumin is rather pungent, so use sparingly.
Drizzle with olive oil and toss to coat.
On a large rectangular sheet of foil, put all the vegetable mixture and the juices on one half, fold over and seal the three edges, forming an "envelope."
Bake in a preheated 400F oven for 1 hour.
Carefully cut open the top layer of the foil to expose the vegetables, bake another 30 minutes to lightly brown and condense the juices.
Serve in a dish by themselves or as a bed to a roast chicken or roast lamb.

 صحة و عافية