A One-Pot Garden Scraps Meal

kitchensinkpot

Before I came down with the Great Attack of the TIFF Flu 2009 (named as such because the worst part coincided with the Toronto International Film Festival) a lot of our meals looked like some version of this one. They probably looked like this one throughout the flu debacle as well but 1. my memory is shot and 2. Davin did all of the cooking.

But getting back to my point, which is increasingly lost these days underneath a jumble of words and thoughts that refuse to string together (a lingering symptom of the TIFF Flu), we were eating like this because it was the end of the summer. And you know how the end of the summer is; all sorts of surprises are popping up in the garden, the fridge and counter-top bowls are overflowing with bits of this and that all poised to rot at any moment and a troop of fruit flies waiting on standby to get their big break. I had also just scored this little single-portion casserole dish/dutch oven on sale for half price, rekindling my love for the one-pot meal.

These meals are insanely easy to make and come with the added bonus of clearing out those little scraps of this and that, that linger in the fridge, too small to serve any other purpose. The meal depicted in the above photo was actually my lunch one weekday afternoon. I like this as a work-day lunch meal because it takes only a few minutes to prepare. I can then pop it in the oven, set the timer, go back to work, and resurface when lunch is done.

It’s the meal that practically makes itself!

Every dish is different depending on what’s on hand, but if you’re looking for some ideas, here’s how I make mine:

First, pre-heat the oven to about 350-400 F. Cut up the vegetables into manageable pieces, toss in a sprinkling of olive oil, add chopped herbs (thyme, parsley, oregano, and sage) from the rooftop garden, a pinch of grey sea salt (I have a weakness for fancy salts) and throw in some kind of protein to finish. Fresh, new potatoes are a good addition, too. I’ve been known to add a few capers, a squeeze of lemon, or oven-dried tomatoes. I add a single leaf of the rounded German ‘Berggarten’ sage from my community garden plot when I want to be fancy. I am not against adding a melting cheese in the last minute or a sprinkle of Parmesan to finish.

Gayla Trail
Gayla is a writer, photographer, and former graphic designer with a background in the Fine Arts, cultural criticism, and ecology. She is the author, photographer, and designer of best-selling books on gardening, cooking, and preserving.

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10 thoughts on “A One-Pot Garden Scraps Meal

  1. Perfect! We’ve been having meals like that a lot lately too. I love it! Though I do get comments like, “why is there eggplant in these potatoes”? Heh.

  2. mmmmmm thats looks yummy! Im making a list of all the cooking utensils I’ll need before i move out for the first time, I’ll need to add casserole dish now!

  3. this is such a grand and easy meal-yum.

    i adore your blog, and your book:) you inspired a fire escape herb “garden” of my own this past summer. thank you!

  4. I love one pot meals. My fave summer one is throwing tomatoes, onions,garlic,zukes,okra,peppers with herbs in a pot. Simmer and eat hot or cold.

  5. Ha, I love it! I do that here too…but I call it “compost soup”…I rescue all the veggie bits before they go to the compost, boil them in veggie stock, add organic turkey wontons from the farmer’s market and voila, a delicious meal for days.

  6. looks like a meal and a half- try my chicken in a bag… chicken, red onion, olive oil, rosemary, lemons, chopped carrots… put it in a ziplock bag for the day and roast @350. Gets me through cold nights :) So simple….

    The name is gross, but makes me laugh.

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