• They are one pot so much less effort.
• The starchier sweetness improves your baking adding a ton more cozy feeling.
• When I bake my kitchen is warm at the same time.
• It is a recipe that you can do as a big batch with minimal prep and have all week long in the fridge.
• It pairs well with pasta, rice or any grains,can be rolled as wraps or made into a salad.

Ingredients for baked root vegetables.

The vegetables: the baked vegetable tray is one recipe that allows you so much flexibility in terms of what you can have. You can make it as colourful as you like or as monochrome as you prefer. Here is a list of vegetables I like to throw into the tray.

• Sweet potatoes
• Carrot
• Turnip
• Potato
• Radish
• Swedes
• Beetroot

For roasting: Olive oil, salt and herbs are the ones that work. The herbs I have chosen is rosemary and oregano. You can use thyme or basil as well. 

Lets make baked root vegetables

The baked vegetables is the best use of a roasting tray.

Prep the vegetables: choose starchy tough vegetables to start with. Wash thoroughly. Cut them into big chunks or dices as you prefer. Keep the beets separately. The carrots, potato sweet potato, radish, parsnip, swedes, turnip can all go together.

Coat them in flavours. Since the vegetables are going to be soft and bland, it is best to coat them with flavours. Sprinkle salt, pepper abd drizzle oil and toss them well. For flavours I prefer to add fresh study herbs that just dont burn away. Rosemary, oregano and thyme are my first choice. Go with what feels natural to you. You can replace the pepper with chilli flakes if you like the heat. Lets the vegetable mix sit while you preheat the oven
Ensure that the beets are coated and kept separate.

Bake: preheat the oven at 180 degrees for 10 minutes. Place the vegetables on a roasting tray. Spread them out evenly. Poke in pieces of beets into the gaps so they cook along. Roast the vegetables for 35 to 40 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius on heat both from up and down. Half way through the time, flip the vegetables over to ensure even roasting. After about 35 minutes the vegetables will be ready and fork tender. Remove from heat and direct to the table. Or cool and proceed for storage.

Meal prep and storage

The baked root vegetables are wonderful to add bulk to any meal or in the lunch box.

Is this a vegan recipe?

Baked root vegetable is an excellent vegan platter. It is filling, a mix of good healthy fibre and carbs and perfect for any vegan meal.

How to make baked root vegetables into a salad?

Once you have the baked veggies in meal prep you can have a hearty salad with it. For the dressing I prepare a generous mix of lemon and lime juice with some pepper and salt. Then you need some freshness. Chop up some tomatoes, a cucumber and handful of oregano, mint and parsley. Add all this into the mixing bowl with double the quantity of baked vegetables. Pour the dressing over it. Toss well and serve immediately. They are great sides to meals and double up as salads. You can add a bunch to your breakfasts to as hash.

How do you ensure the beets don’t leech the colour all over?

There are a couple of ways you can achieve this. If you peel chop and place the beets separately, then place them on the tray to bake it will have zero leaching.
Another method is to ensure you add the beets right at the end, a quick toss in the oil and salt and straight into the oven.

Other baked recipes from us that make a good mealprep

Baked whole cauliflower

Dried peas nuggets

Baked veggie sheek kebabs

Paneer puffs

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Hope you enjoy making this batch of low effort baked root vegetables. When you make your batch using this recipe, do share your thoughts and improvements in the comments below.
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Once we had gotten through some soup recipes last week, the taste buds needed a  gentle wake-up. Yet we are not up to the stage where stronger curries and foods can take over and run as a usual week. That will need a bit more time and getting back up to. Meanwhile, we have some veggies in the fridge that need to be used up. Here is a very easy shalgam ke baaji recipe made with fresh turnips. This dry turnip curry is vegan, gluten-free and free of nuts and coconut. Try out the shalgam ke baaji with fresh rotis and salad.

Understanding Turnips

There were two turnips I picked up with my grocery list. Turnips or neep are tap root vegetables with pale white skin or a green /pink top. They resemble beetroot in shape. Both the leaves and the bulbous root are edible. A fresh batch of spring turnips is delicious as salads similar to radishes. However, as the season progresses, I prefer cooking them to bring out the sweet flavour. To use the root, peel them and separate them from the greens. Chop up into pieces or wedges and proceed with your recipe.

What do turnips taste like?

Though the turnips look a lot like white beetroot, they taste a lot closer to radishes. Raw turnips have a characteristic crunch and a mustard green-like flavour. This flavour vanishes upon cooking replacing it with a mellow sweet flavour. 

Turnips in Indian cooking

Turnips are not alien to Indian cuisine and are called shalgam. Typically this is grown in colder regions where you will find it more popular in cuisine than in the hot humid regions. Turnips in curry, stirfry or grated as a salad. Today’s recipe is a semi-dry preparation called shalgam ke baaji.

Masalas and ingredients for this baaji

Shalgam/ turnips- Fresh turnip roots that are peeled and diced are the ones that are needed to make this turnip dry curry. A peeler will work to get the peel off n then dice the flesh. You can use the turnip greens in this recipe. Wash and clean the leaves. Strip them off the stalk and chop them to add along with the diced root.

Onion- a small bit of onion sauteed adds so much flavour to this dish. I have used half a small white onion. If you have shallots, use that for extra flavour.

Spices – two levels of flavour are created in this simple recipe. One at first by tempering the fenugreek seeds and the carom seeds. For the second layer of flavour, salt, turmeric powder, roasted cumin powder and curry powder ( like Ken’s) is all you need. This curry powder can be sambhar powder, rasam powder, garam masala or Kitchen king masala.

 The recipe card below gives the step-by-step details to make this recipe. Pin it onto your board from here for later use. 

Putting together a meal

Shalgam ke baaji on a cooler night with a couple of phulkas sounds like home. Leftovers find themselves comfortably hidden in a curry bun or a sandwich for lunch the next day. These are the easiest ways I have tried with the turnip dry curry. As we were unwell, we had it with payaru kanji.

Meal prep and saving the leftovers.

Usually, I prep and chop the turnips on the weekend to help my day at work. The prepared baaji will stay well for 3 to 4 days in the fridge. I have never frozen this shalgam ki baaji. If you have success with this please let us know in the comments.

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Shalgham ki baaji is a very basic side dish recipe, best enjoyed warm. When you make this, write a comment with a rating. Share this recipe with friends and family who may also enjoy some turnips.

We have added this post to the A-Z recipe challenge,  ingredients in Hindi. Shalgam or turnips are one among the many ingredients which start with S. 

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