Roasted Vegetables and Sage Pesto Baked Salmon

Roasted vegetables are a staple in my cooking throughout the year but never more consistently than in the fall and winter months. The entire house smells delicious when there is a pan of assorted vegetables and a few cloves of garlic roasting in a hot oven. For this weeks post I thought I would share one of my favorite roasted vegetable recipes. It’s a slightly altered recipe from one of my favorite cookbooks,

This recipe is for Roasted Vegetables and Sage Pesto Baked Salmon. You don’t actually need a particular recipe to enjoy roasted vegetables. They are delicious with just about any dish. You can serve them with risotto for example. Here, I mixed vegetables with the risotto and served it on a bed of sautéed spinach and baby kale drizzled with some of the sage pesto for my daughter who is not a big salmon fan. (She doesn’t know what she’s missing!)

For those of you who are screaming at your computer saying, “My kids would NEVER eat THAT” – My kids didn’t like broccoli the first time I served it to them. I just kept serving it. In time, I broke them! Eventually they started to appreciate it and even request it. Over time they developed tastes for just about any vegetable. Sautéed spinach, kale and rainbow chard with garlic and olive oil is one of their favorites. I guess what I’m saying is, they will eat what ever they develop a taste for. You never know. Right now my daughter isn’t loving salmon but I think that’s partly her trying to assert her teenage independence and partly because I make it a lot and she’s simply on strike.
This version of pesto is slightly different than the classic pesto that is so popular with basil and pine nuts. I love the earthy flavor created by the combo of sage and kale. I also love the vibrant green that it produces.

Roasted vegetables are so versatile. They are also delicious with chicken, red meat or simply by themselves. I will often make a large sheet pan of assorted roasted vegetables and keep them in the refrigerator to add to rice bowls for lunch, salads, charcuterie boards, or even on homemade pizza. The options are endless.

Our roasted vegetable recipe changes throughout the seasons. This time of year we are roasting mostly root vegetables including carrots, beets, potatoes and onions with squash, Brussel sprouts, turnips and rutabaga. In the summer you can use fresh zucchini, bell peppers, corn and eggplant. In the springtime try adding artichokes, peas and asparagus.One of the beauties of this recipe is that there are fewer dishes to wash. At the end of the day after we’ve enjoyed a wonderful meal, my least favorite task is to get up and scrub pots and pans and clean up more dishes than necessary. With this recipe, everything goes in one pan and all the pesto ingredients are in your food processor. Clean up is as easy as possible.

Roasted Vegetable and Sage Pesto Baked Salmon

slightly adapted from the Half Baked Harvest cookbook.

INGREDIENTS

3 small beats, halved
Two carrots, chopped
1/2 red onion
1 small to medium sweet potato, diced
12 baby potatoes, halved
12 Brussel sprouts, halved
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
kosher salt and freshly ground pepper

Sage Pesto

1 cup fresh sage leaves
1 cup baby kale
1/3 cup toasted pistachios
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
crushed red pepper flakes

Salmon

4 5-6oz Salmon fillet is
1/4 cup grated Manchego cheese
fresh lemon juice optional

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 450°F
On a rimmed baking sheet, toss the beets, carrots, sweet potatoes, baby potatoes and brussels sprouts with the olive oil. Season with salt and black pepper. Roast for about 20 minutes or until the veggies are slightly tender.
Meanwhile, make the Pesto!
In a food processor, combined the sage, kale and pistachios and pulse until finely chopped. Add the Parmesan and pulse again.
With the motor running, drizzle in the all of oil. Season with salt and red pepper flakes.
Remove the veggies from the oven and push them to one side of the pan put the salmon on the other side. Rub a few tablespoons of the sage pesto over each file.
Return the pan to the oven and roast for 10 to 20 minutes more, until the salmon which is your desired doneness and the veggies are soft and start to caramelize on the edges.
Remove the pan from the oven and top each filet with some of the Manchego cheese to melt. If desired, squeeze a drop of lemon juice over the salmon. Serve with roasted veggies and extra pesto.