Polenta with Three Root Ragu

Perhaps not the best food portrait ever…but it tasted delicious.

A co-worker heading out of town was cleaning out her refrigerator and we ended up with four organic sweet potatoes and a good idea for a future frugal fundamentals column: sharing with your friends and neighbors is a good way to avoid both waste and having to eat the same leftovers over and over. Anyway, I decided to try an autumn vegetable variation on the traditional meat-based ragu. In fact there’s very little traditional about this dish, but it turned out delicious nonetheless.

Three Root Ragu

2 medium turnips
1 large potato
1 medium sweet potato
1 cup red wine
1/2 cup milk
3 or 4 scallions
3 Tbsp fresh diced sage*
3 Tbsp olive oil
1 Tbsp butter
crushed red pepper
salt and pepper

1. Chop all the root veggies into 1/2″ pieces. Cut the scallions into small slices, including some of the greens.
2. Put the olive oil and butter in a medium saucepan and sautee the veggies and the sage until the roots begin to soften.
3. Turn the heat down, add the wine, milk, red pepper, and S&P to taste. Simmer for about 45 minutes, stirring occasionally until the vegetables become very soft. It’s ready to serve!

I served the ragu on top of some polenta with slices of soft boiled egg for protein and chiffonaded basil for garnish.

*Ours came from our indoor herb garden – the subject of another frugal fundamentals post coming in the near future.

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