Oven Roasted Vegetables recipe

What a great time of year for this colourful medley of veg! The amazing thing about roasting vegetables as your side dish is that you can use any vegetables you want. What are your favourite? Now mix these together, coat them in whatever your favourite flavouring is, whether it be plain olive oil or a chilli and cumin blend. It's all your choice. There are no rules!

Here is a simple recipe I made the other night

(Feeds 4 people as a side dish)

Vegetables:
1 yellow pepper - sliced into strips and halved
1 red pepper - sliced into strips
1/2 large onion - sliced and halved
1 zucchini - sliced and halved
1/2 eggplant (UK - aubergine) - sliced and quartered (please see NOTE on how to prepare egg plant)
1 cup sliced mushrooms
1/2 garlic bulb - cloves separated but left in shell
2 tbp fresh parsley- chopped

Flavour: Vinaigrette
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp mustard powder
salt & pepper to taste
1 tsp dried thyme

Instructions:
1. Whisk together all ingredients for the vinaigrette
2. Combine all vegetables, parsley and vinaigrette together is a roasting pan or baking dish. Toss until well combined
3. Sprinkle with coarse sea salt and fresh ground pepper
4. Place vegetables in a 450 F  (220 C) oven until vegetables are tender and starting to brown at the edges (about 35 min)

Once your vegetables are plated you'll be at the best part! Squeezing out all the lovely flesh from the garlic shells. Oh yeah!!

NOTE:  EGGPLANT TIP - To avoid your eggplant releasing too much water and from it tasting too bitter simply lay slices out flat, cover in some slat and let sit for about 30min to an hour. You will see beads of "sweat" all over, this is the bitter water being released. Now rinse the eggplant and you're ready to go!
Also if you don't like tough skin you can peel the eggplant, but it's not necessary, totally personal choice.

NOTE2: ADDING POTATO - If you're adding potato or a hard root vegetable such as squash to your roasted veg make sure to cut them bite size so they cook through. Then you have a couple cooking options
1. Turn your oven up a bit (about 475 F / 245 C). You may also need to leave them in for a few more minutes.
2. Or you can par boil the 'hard' vegetable before mixing into the rest of the vegetables.