{"id":27393,"date":"2026-09-29T09:00:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-29T13:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/?p=27393"},"modified":"2026-08-31T13:55:01","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T17:55:01","slug":"root-to-stem-cooking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/2026\/09\/29\/root-to-stem-cooking\/","title":{"rendered":"Root to Stem Cooking"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

photo from Magnific<\/p><\/div>\n

By Nancy Berkoff, EdD, RD<\/p>\n

Depending on the weather where you live, you may still have remnants of seasonal produce, in the backyard or available in the supermarket.\u00a0This provides the opportunity to do some root-to-stem cooking, maximizing produce use and minimizing waste, as well as enjoying seasonal produce prior to the winter growing break.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s wonderful how many plant food parts are very useable, as well as tasty! For example:<\/p>\n

Broccoli and cauliflower stalks can be peeled and chopped, used in place of cabbage for \u201cslaws,\u201d as well as added to salads, cooked rice or grains, or soups.<\/p>\n

Carrot tops, well-cleaned, can be used in place of fresh parsley. If you are saut\u00e9ing, keep the pan hot and throw in carrots tops to create a crisp garnish. Add carrot tops to fresh green salads, potato or pasta salad, or chopped into cracked grain salads (such as tabbouleh).<\/p>\n

Carrot tops, beet greens, and radish leaves have lots of nutrients, and flavor!\u00a0Use carrot greens in salsas,\u00a0saut\u00e9 beet greens in olive oil with garlic or add radish leaves where you would like a peppery flavor, such as in pesto, fresh salads, or soups.<\/p>\n

If you use leeks in a recipe, keep the dark green tops. Steam\u00a0or microwave them to tenderize, and then add to soups (how about French leek soup, rather than onion soup), saut\u00e9 with a small amount of oil, sesame seeds, and walnuts or peanuts or stir-fry with celery and mushrooms and serve over vegetable rice (see below).<\/p>\n

The \u201cribs\u201d from chard or kale can be roasted, seasoned, and chopped, and use to top pizza or focaccia and left whole and served in place of crackers to use with dips.<\/p>\n

Leave the skin on root vegetables such as\u00a0carrots, sweet potatoes, and parsnips to retain the most nutrition, as much of the nutrient content is found just under the skin. Scrubbing well can replace peeling. If you do need to peel baking potatoes, wash them well and then roast the peels in the oven, or on the grill, until crisp, and serve as a snack (in place of chips), or use instead of croutons.<\/p>\n

Celery is a \u201cuse every part\u201d vegetable. The celery \u201cheart\u201d and leaves add flavor to salads, rice, and grains and even make a salad on their own, combined with grapes and apples.<\/p>\n

Homemade soup is easy to prepare if you have a savory stock available. Save onion pieces (not the skins), mushroom stems, celery leaves, corn cobs, cauliflower stalks, fennel leaves,\u00a0the woody ends of large asparagus stalks, over large, stringy fresh green beans (snap off the ends), and carrot tops and carrot scraps in the freezer. When you are ready, place your collection in a large pot and cover with water; a chef\u2019s ratio is one pound of vegetables (about\u00a02 cups) to a quart of water (about 4 cups), but that is up to you. Allow to simmer for at least an hour, if not longer, remove from the stove, strain, and store in the refrigerator or freezer. Use stock where you would usually use water, for cooking rice, pasta, grains, beans, or rice or in veggie smoothies or to reconstitute soup mixes, and of course, to create fast homemade soups.<\/p>\n

Create a \u201cgreen sauce,\u201d your version of pesto, with carrot tops, beet greens, radish leaves, chard, spinach, or other greens, added to a blender with or without walnuts or pine nuts, a drizzle of olive oil, minced garlic, and nutritional yeast. Use with pasta, rice, grains, lentils, or cooked mushrooms, to top pizza, or as a sauce for wraps.<\/p>\n

Consider making vegetable \u201crice\u201d (veggies\u00a0transformed into a rice shape).\u00a0Jicama, daikon radish,\u00a0cauliflower, broccoli stalks, beets, winter squash, rutabagas, and sweet potatoes can be large diced and then, using a food processor or food mill, processed to resemble rice.\u00a0These can then be cooked, and served as an alternative to rice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Nancy Berkoff, EdD, RD Depending on the weather where you live, you may still have remnants of seasonal produce, in the backyard or available in the supermarket.\u00a0This provides the opportunity to do some root-to-stem cooking, maximizing produce use and minimizing waste, as well as enjoying seasonal produce prior to the winter growing break. It\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27393"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27395,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27393\/revisions\/27395"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}