Roasted Root Vegetables with Horseradish Sauce

This dish was inspired by a fall trip to the Old Strathcona Farmer’s Market several years ago. This was my contribution to the Slow Food AGM and Brunch at Mary Bailey’s house this year. Root vegetables are plentiful after the harvest, and there were some I hadn’t tried, and some I wasn’t sure would work with this recipe this year, but I just bought every one of them that I could find to go home and play with!

The sauce pulls the entire recipe together for me. The sharp and tangy horseradish with the herby dill and fatty butter (yes butter) meld so well with the starchy fall roots. I used a huge variety. See how many you can find in the photo.

There are white and yellow beets, and pink potato (a large one that I peeled) and the parsnip and the yam. The white disc at the bottom middle of the photo is the parsley root and the rutabaga is a bit above it. The purple and pink baby potatoes and a carrot are what I see.

Below is the rutabaga and the parsley root, and then some baby beets and the pink potatoes.

I usually try to scrounge some horseradish myself, as it grows wild all over the northern Alberta countryside, but haven’t been too lucky in that area lately. It is surprisingly expensive at the market, but worth it. I have a wonderful soup I make with it I will have to post before spring.

I used: turnip, rutabaga, parsley root, parsnips, carrots, sweet potatoes, yams, and a whole variety of baby potatoes as well as a variety of baby beets. It was so much fun cleaning them and smelling their earthy goodness. I made a double batch of the sauce, tossed them all in it, then sorted them all out again for the roasting on individual cookie sheets. I make this same recipe in a casserole dish, but parboil the vegetables instead of roasting them, simply toss them in the sauce and then keep them warm to finish in the oven. The outcome is considerably less “rustic”, and lacks the caramelization the roasting creates. I thought this occasion suited “rustic”.

I have also grated the horseradish on a regular hand held grater, and it turns out lovely. it just takes a considerable amount of time as it is such a hard and woody root, so found my Thermomix did a superb job of the horseradish in seconds