19 Favorite Recipes with Winter Vegetables

It seems like sweet and tender spring and summer vegetables are easy to sell. They’re fresh and bright and everyone can feel good about eating seasonally when tomatoes and beans and asparagus and zucchini are abundant in local markets. The gnarly and thick-skinned cousins of those warm-weather darlings don’t always get so much love, though, and that’s a darn shame. Especially since there’s a good chance that our ancestors survived a winter somewhere back in history thanks to long-stored winter vegetables.

This year, I subscribed to a CSA winter share, something I had not done in several years, and I’m finding myself with more winter vegetables than I can easily remember what to do with. A perusal of The Messy Apron Archives, however, helps bring back good memories of the fun and fabulous ways I’ve been loving winter vegetables.

Here is a list of 18 favorite Archive recipes that celebrate everything from winter squash to all kinds of roots and tubers, plus some members of the cabbage family. Chopped, shredded, or pureed winter vegetables are surprisingly versatile and I’ve presented a variety of recipes styles here. There are salads, soups, roasted dishes, dishes with pasta and noodles, stir fries and curries, and a few other flavorful offerings. I hope you find something you absolutely love!

Winter vegetables can make great salads, whether they are utilized raw as in this Creamy Parsnip Slaw with Peppers and Olives or roasted and cooled as in Wheat Berry and Squash Salad with Seeds and Sage

Or Roasted Autumn Vegetable Salad with Molasses Mustard Vinaigrette.

Long simmering soups built to warm us on cold days are natural places for winter vegetables, whether they be creamy soups like Creamy White Onion Soup

And Root Vegetable Soup with Mustard,

 

Or brothy soups like White Bean Soup with Bacon, Squash, and Kale.

Probably the greatest percentage of the winter veggies I acquire end up in a roasting pan at a high temperature in the oven. Roasted Vegetables and Roasted Vegetables with Sausage (which I have been making with chickpeas in place of the sausage) are go-to meal items in my kitchen just about every week throughout the winter.

I also love Roasted Cauliflower, Chickpeas and Olives

Winter vegetables play well with pasta, too, like in Macaroni and Cheese with Sweet Potatoes and Green Onions, Pasta with Shredded Winter Vegetables, and this Tomato Sauce with Root Vegetables, which is as versatile as any other favorite pasta sauce.

A stir-fry or curry may take a little longer to cook when loaded with winter vegetables, but their flavors are worth waiting for. Winter vegetables love spice, so they are delicious in dishes like Spicy Cabbage and Noodle Stir Fry,

Spicy Spaghetti Squash Stir Fry,

And Winter Squash and Onion Curry with Yogurt Sauce

Shredded roots and squashes are great enveloped in crust to make pies like Winter Vegetable Galettes with Cheddar, Mustard, and Caramelized Onions

 

And they’re good in Beet and Carrot Burgers

 

And, finally, pureed winter vegetables may be great on their own as a mashed potato-like side dish, but they’re fabulous in things like Parsnip Soufflé (which could probably be made with other vegetable purees) and Winter Squash Risotto. (Don’t feel like messing with a squash? Try this recipe with canned pumpkin!)

Yes, seasonal vegetable love is easy in the middle of summer, but I’ve really learned to enjoy the roots and fruits that can last through the cold months. Whether they’re sweet, bitter, bland, or sharp, all kinds of winter vegetables nourish us well through the cold and dark. Give them a chance, won’t you?

Other posts like this one: 13 Hot Soups for Cold Times, 21 Favorite Winter Salads

Archive Recipe: Beet and Carrot Burgers

Until just the other day, I hadn’t made these weird little veggie burgers in years. I love them, so I missed them, but I really felt no special compunction to make them for all that. You see, and I know I’ve told you this before, I hate the taste of beets. I always have. There’s some kind of alchemy going on in this recipe, though, that renders beets not only edible, but delicious. Even crave-able.

I would never go out and buy beets to make this recipe, but I took on a winter CSA subscription this year, and my home is now equipped with beets-a-plenty. This has always been my favorite way to use up those bountiful roots, so as soon as I had the time, I made them. They are absolutely as wonderful as I remembered! I’m so happy!

There are a lot of ingredients in these humble-looking veggie patties, but no tricky procedures to follow. I just start with the food processor, which I highly recommend if you have access to one. For me it makes any recipe with this much shredded vegetables not only easier, but just plain possible. All of the ingredients get piled into a great big bowl, mixed together, portioned out on a baking pan, and baked.

I used the Chioggia variety of beets to make the batch of burgers I photographed here. They are not so bloody red, being a pretty red and white candy stripe instead. As a result, my veggie burgers were paler in color than would be accomplished with another variety of beet. 

I like to serve these burgers on toasted English muffins with dill pickles or dill relish and mayonnaise. They’re good with ketchup and mustard on a hamburger bun, too, or they’re fine nestled into a pita pocket. I think there are other root vegetables that might be able to take the place of shredded beets here, but, I’m kind of growing sympathetic toward these earthy, old-fashioned, knobs of plant flesh. Will I ever come to love them? You know, at this moment, I’m more hopeful of that than I’ve ever been.

Beet and Carrot Burgers

adapted from Farmer John’s Cookbook

2 cups peeled, grated beets

2 cups grated carrots

½ cup grated onion

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 cup cooked rice, preferably brown rice

1 cup grated cheddar cheese

1 cup finely chopped walnuts

½ cup sunflower seeds

2 eggs, lightly beaten

1/3 cup vegetable oil

½ cup finely chopped fresh parsley

¼ cup flour

2 Tbs soy sauce or tamari

¼ tsp cayenne pepper

½ tsp salt

1.  Preheat oven to 350 F. Combine all of the ingredients in a very large bowl.  Mix until completely combined.

2.  Divide the mixture into 12 equal portions.  Form each portion into a patty and place on baking pans that have been well-greased or lined with a silicone baking mat. The patties will not seem to hold together well at first, but they will solidify more as they bake.

3. Bake the patties at 350 F for 25-35 minutes, or until they are well set and beginning to brown on the edges.

4.  Serve immediately on an English muffin, on a bun or in a pita (or on a plate), or cool on pans and freeze.

To freeze the burgers, place them in a single layer on a plate or pan on wax paper or parchment paper.  Freeze until firm.  Remove from the pan and store flat in a freezer bag or other freezer-safe container, separating layers with wax paper or parchment paper.

Makes 12 veggie burgers.

Other recipes like this one: Lentil Barley Burgers; Potato and Sauerkraut Cakes; Winter Vegetable Galettes with Cheddar, Mustard, and Caramelized Onions

Archive Recipe of the Week: Winter Vegetable Galettes

This is a recipe that goes waaaay back to the first year I spent fiddling around on these pages. I still like to make it at least once every winter, not the least reason being that making it once means making a few meals in one fell swoop. I just feed the two of us, my husband and me, at each supper, so one pie lasts for two meals. But that’s not all. There are two pies in a whole recipe and these happen to freeze quite well to lie ready and waiting for a busy night’s meal.

 

I’m not sure I really had that in mind when I first posted this recipe. I didn’t have a job and was blogging because I loved trying new recipes and wanted to talk about them. Now, I work full time at a position that kicks my butt sometimes and am blogging because I can’t stop. (Okay, and because I still love it.) And I’m making dishes like Winter Vegetable Galettes partly for the leftovers.

 

I actually kind of made up this recipe myself, starting with the original version of this Butternut Squash Pie with Feta and Mint. I turned it into a galette instead of a pie, got rid of the phyllo dough (not that there’s anything wrong with phyllo dough) in favor of a whole wheat pie crust, mixed up the vegetables using whatever was in the refrigerator, swapped out the feta for cheddar, added more onion, and put in some mustard, which I really like with some of the stronger root vegetables.

Speaking of those vegetables, I get the best flavor with a mixture of sweet and strong ones. Most recently I used carrots, parsnips and rutabaga, but squash and turnip are good, too. This really isn’t anything to get too fussy about. In my original post, I called this recipe a “Bounty Buster” because I applied it to using up extra vegetables I seemed to accumulate from our winter CSA share. Root vegetables still seem to accumulate in my kitchen somehow, and I still like using this recipe to accumulate some leftovers for busy weeks.

 

Winter Vegetable Galettes with Cheddar, Mustard and Caramelized Onions

Use a food processor with a shredding blade to make quick work of shredding the vegetables.

I recently made the second galette into four smaller turnovers instead, which I froze for another meal.

 

Whole Wheat Pastry

1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 teaspoon salt
10 tablespoons cold, unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
2/3 cup ice water, or more as needed

1. In the bowl of a food processor, combine the all-purpose flour, whole wheat pastry flour, and salt. Pulse a few times to combine

2. Add the butter pieces. Pulse until all of the butter is in flour-coated chunks no larger than small peas.

3. Add about 1/3 cup ice water. Pulse until all the water is incorporated and the dough just holds together when squeezed, adding more water a little at a time as needed. Try not to over-process the dough, but make sure it will form a ball when pulled together.

4. On a lightly floured surface, gently press the dough together into a ball. Divide the ball in half and form each half into a disk. Wrap each disk in plastic wrap and refrigerate or freeze until ready to use. Dough is easiest to handle when chilled at least 15 minutes. (If you freeze the dough, place the wrap disk(s) in a freezer bag. Thoroughly thaw in the refrigerator before using.

Alternatively, the pastry dough can be made by hand: Cut in the butter with a pastry blender or with knives or a fork. Toss the mixture with the ice water, using only enough to allow the dough to come together when squeezed. Proceed as above.

 

Filling and Baking

4 cups shredded winter vegetables, such as winter squash, parsnips, carrots, rutabagas, turnips, celeriac, sweet potatoes, etc.
¼ cup bulgur
¾ teaspoon salt, divided
1 tablespoon olive oil
¾ pound yellow onions (about 2 medium), peeled and thinly sliced
3 ounces shredded cheddar cheese (sharp or extra sharp preferred
2 tablespoons Dijon or coarse-grained mustard
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water (egg wash)

1. Combine the shredded vegetables, bulgur, ½ teaspoon salt and pepper in a large bowl. Let stand at least 30 minutes. (Mixture can be held longer, but cover and refrigerate if you’re going to let it stand more than an hour.)

2. Preheat oven to 375 F. To make the caramelized onions, heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onions and remaining ¼ teaspoon salt. Cook over medium heat about 20-30 minutes or until very soft and golden brown. Stir occasionally. Add a little water and/or reduce the he heat if the onions seem to be getting too brown before getting soft. Set aside to cool slightly.

3. Add the onions, cheese, mustard and garlic to the vegetable mixture. Mix well.

4. Roll out one disk (1/2 recipe) of the whole wheat pastry into a 12-inch circle. Carefully transfer the dough to a large baking sheet, leaving room for a second one of the same size if possible. Place half of the vegetable mixture into the center of the dough circle leaving a few inches of pastry at the border. Pull the edges of the dough up over the filling, leaving the majority of the filling exposed in the middle of the galette. Repeat with the second half of the pastry dough and the remaining filling and place it on the same pan if there is room. (If not, use a second pan.)

4. Brush the pastry with egg wash. Bake at 375 for 40-45 minutes or until the crust is crisp and lightly browned. Remove from the oven and let stand 10 minutes. Cut into wedges to serve.

 You could also fully enclose the filling in the crust if you would like it to remain moister, or make small turnovers. Each kind of pie can be frozen after baked. Wrap in aluminum foil and seal in a freezer bag. Reheat on a pan at 375 F for about 20 minutes.

 Makes 6-8 main-dish servings.

Other recipes like this one: Butternut Squash Pie with Feta and Mint, Pasta with Shredded Winter Vegetables, Winter Squash and Leek Empanadas with Sage