When Life Hands You Rutabagas, Make Rutabaga Fries

Last year, Robin, Dave, and I were part of an informal winter CSA with one of the farmers we met through the Seacoast Grower's Association. It was a little hit or miss -- sometimes we'd get to Portsmouth on Friday evening to find a bag of goodies handing from the doorknob -- often times, not. But there was something satisfying about having farmers' market-quality food throughout the winter, especially since this particular farmer had access to a greenhouse, so we frequently got a bag full of fresh greens as part of our order.

This year, we decided to make things more official, by joining the Winter CSA through Heron Pond Farm. Of course, this means dealing with vegetables we probably otherwise would never buy. Like rutabagas, for instance. Other than potatoes and raw carrots, we never ate much in the way of root vegetables when I was growing up. In fact, the first time I remember actually tasting rutabaga was one Thanksgiving when one of our guests brought some pureed rutabaga with peas. But on Week Two, our CSA share included two rutabagas.

As we were planning to grill a couple of grass-fed rib eye steaks from Wee Bit Farm for dinner, a puree seemed less than optimal. Since oven-baked sweet potato fries are a frequent accompaniment to steak in our house, we thought why not try serving the rutabagas that way? We peeled them, cut them into half-inch sticks, seasoned them with Penzey's Northwoods Fire Seasoning and a little olive oil, put them on a well-oiled baking sheet and baked them just like we would potatoes.

The Northwoods Fire Seasoning is a blend of coarse salt, chipolte pepper, Hungarian paprika, Tellicherry black pepper, garlic, rosemary, thyme, and cayenne, so it was a great complement to the sweet, spicy tast of the rutabaga. I think that chopped thyme or rosemary with some garlic powder would also be good.

While the rutabaga oven fried don't crisp up like regular regular potato fries, they don't get all soft like the sweet potato version either. When they browned up nicely, I just sprinkled them with a little coarse salt and served them up with our steaks. Quite frankly, they were delicious! Best of all, I now  feel ready for anything our CSA gives us. Kohlrabi? Bring it on!

Oven-Baked Rutabaga Fries
Ingredients
2 medium rutabagas, peel and cut into sticks 1/2 inch wide
Olive oil, for drizzling and coating baking pan
Penzey's Northwoods Fire Seasoning (or other spice blend) to taste
Kosher salt for sprinkling

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Drizzle olive oil over rutabaga, put in a paper bag or plastic baggie, add seasonings and shake to coat.
3. Place rutabaga on a lightly oiled baking sheet and bake in middle of the oven for ten minutes.
4. Turn rutabaga fries over and cook for another ten minutes, or until well browned.
5. Sprinkle with kosher salt and serve.