There’s nothing like hauling home a tote brimming with farmers market produce — except for the feeling of devouring a beautiful bowl made from those finds! Bowls of Plenty, a stunning seasonal cookbook by James Beard Award-winning food writer, Carolynn Carreño is an A-Z guide to doing just that for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Carolynn has co-authored, count ’em, twelve cookbooks in total, including a couple of volumes with restaurant goddess, Nancy Silverton like Mozza At Home.
If, like us, you’re obsessing over meals in bowls these days, this little book is a trusted, foodie-approved guide to keeping things simple, fresh, healthy and innovative. Here’s a recipe from the book to whet your appetite…
The beauty of the squash and carrots in this bowl is the color you achieve when they’re roasted. The color is the result of caramelization – the root of this word being ‘caramel’ is no coincidence. Roasting vegetables brings out their natural sweetness. Winter squash keeps at room temperature for weeks, if not months. During the fall and winter, I keep a display of assorted squash in my house, so I can admire their beauty while also having them to cook for hunger emergencies. You can roast cauliflower, fennel or sliced sweet potatoes — in place of the vegetables called for here. This recipe is vegetarian. To make it vegan, skip the egg and dress the bowl with a tahini dressing in place of the yogurt green goddess.
Yogurt Green Goddess: A little yogurt turns a simple lemony vinaigrette into something totally original — and really flavorful. We used a similar vinaigrette in Nancy Silverton’s Mozza at Home, which we were finishing up at the time I started working on this one. I had a jar of the dressing in my refrigerator and found myself drizzling it onto all kinds of salad and roasted vegetable bowls. Make this once and you’ll see for yourself.
Farmers Market Veggie Bowl + Green Goddess Dressing
Serves 4
Ingredients:
For the roasted vegetables:
1 acorn squash, halved lengthwise, seeded, and sliced into ½-inch half-moons
½ pound Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved
1 bunch carrots with greens, scrubbed and halved lengthwise (leaving 1” of greens attached)
3 Tbsp olive oil
2½ tsp kosher salt
freshly ground black pepper
For the bowls:
1 cup Khorasan wheat,* cooked (or farro or spelt)
1 head radicchio, sliced
1½ cups cooked chickpeas or 1 (15-oz) can, drained and rinsed
2 medium-cooked eggs, cut in half
kosher salt
freshly ground black pepper
1 cup roasted salted pepitas (pumpkin seeds)
1 cup radish sprouts (or another type of sprouts or microgreens), optional
*Gluten-free alternative: To make this gluten-free, substitute wild rice, quinoa or sorghum, or a combination, for the Khorasan wheat.
For the yogurt green goddess:
½ cup packed fresh parsley leaves
2 Tbsp packed fresh sage
2 Tbsp packed fresh oregano (or marjoram)
2 Tbsp packed fresh thyme
2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 cup plain Greek yogurt
¼ cup buttermilk (shake before pouring)
juice of ½ lemon
1 garlic clove
½ tsp kosher salt
Directions:
For the vegetables:
Arrange the oven racks: You are going to put one of the baking sheets on the middle rack and one on the oven floor.* (If you have an oven that doesn’t allow you to put a baking sheet on the floor, put the rack as close to the floor as possible.)
Preheat the oven to 500°F.
Toss the vegetables in a big bowl with the oil, salt and pepper and lay them flat on two baking sheets, making sure not to overcrowd them. (If you overcrowd the baking sheets, the vegetables will steam instead of caramelizing.)
Put one baking sheet on the middle rack and one on the floor of the oven or the lowest rack and roast for 10 to 12 minutes, rotating the baking sheets and turning the veggies midway through the baking time so they brown evenly. (I turn the vegetables one by one with tongs to get perfect browning, but if you’d rather just give them a good shake, I hear you.) Remove the vegetables from the oven.
For the yogurt green goddess:
Put all the ingredients in a blender and blend until the dressing is light green. This dressing will keep, covered, for up to 3 days. (Try it as a dip for raw vegetables.)
To prepare the bowls:
Smear a big spoonful of the green goddess in the bottom of each bowl. Scoop the grains into the bowl, and arrange the radicchio, roasted vegetables, and chickpeas on top. Nestle an egg half in the center of each. Season the eggs with salt and pepper, and scatter the pepitas and sprouts, if using, over the bowls. Serve with more green goddess on the side to drizzle at will.
*Note on the oven floor: Putting a sheet pan directly on the oven floor is a trick I learned from a chef friend who had gone from working in restaurants with super powerful ovens to cooking at home. The oven floor provides the hottest, most even and direct heat possible, which means you can get your vegetables nice and caramelized without overcooking them.
