Rutabagas With Ginger Roasted Pears (To carry on a family tradition.)

Staples Family Tradition
Rutabagas With Ginger Roasted Pears (Stephanie's Version)

My family (Staples side) has exactly ONE tradition: every year at Thanksgiving we eat a rutabaga dish of some sort to remember my grandfather who was a POW in WWII. He suffered so much. One of the few things he shared about his experience was that the only thing they had to eat was boiled rutabagas.

Rutabaga is a root vegetable and it has a very strong taste. I have been experimenting with recipes, trying to find one that’s tasty. This year I found one that I will continue to experiment with – I will probably do a few things differently next time. But here’s the recipe I adapted from Epicurious.com.

-1 or 2 rutabagas (recipe calls for 4lbs that are already cut into cubes – unless you purchase them pre-cut do NOT attempt cutting this root on your own. It’s virtually impossible and you might hurt yourself! I just bought it whole and boiled it before cutting it into cubes.)
-Nonstick vegetable oil spray
-1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
-1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger (if you don’t have fresh, jarred will do!)
-1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
-3 firm Anjou pears (about 1 3/4 pounds), peeled, cored, cut into 3/4-inch cubes (whatever type of pear you want to use is fine)

Optional (play around with these ingredients if you’d rather make a lighter dish):
-1/3 cup heavy whipping cream
-5 tablespoons butter
-1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme (I didn’t have any… so… it’s not necessary.)
-Coarse kosher salt

Directions:

1. Cook rutabagas in pot of boiling salted water until tender, about 35 minutes (this can take much longer if you are boiling it whole!).
2. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 400°F. Spray large rimmed baking sheet with nonstick spray. Combine lemon juice, ginger, and sugar in large bowl. Add pears; toss to coat. Spread on prepared sheet. Roast until tender, turning pears every 10 minutes, about 35 minutes total.
3. Drain rutabagas; return to same pot. Mash to coarse puree. Stir over medium heat until excess moisture evaporates, 5 minutes. Add cream, butter, and thyme (or whatever you decide works for you). Mix in pears and any juices from baking sheet. Season with salt and pepper (I did not add salt or pepper).

Hope this works well for you!

Stephanie

Original recipe: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Smashed-Rutabagas-with-Ginger-Roasted-Pears-240414#ixzz1fnEYkHWA

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Happy Christmas!