Whenever someone tells me they don’t like vegetables, I just think, maybe they do but they haven’t had them prepared properly. 

Vegetables by nature tend to be bitter (especially greens!), and our inner cave man senses bitterness as danger. In other words, when our cavemen ancestors were foraging for food they wood be on the lookout for poisonness plants, which tended to be characterized by bitterness. 

Although when compared to POISON, arugula and kale don’t quite have them same effect (let’s hope not), we still have this innate aversion to bitterness. This is only enhanced by our overexposure to sweets and salty foods. Our tastebuds regenerate about every 2 weeks, and are very adaptable. So if we are accustomed to eating sweet and salty foods our taste buds are going to adapt to sense all in foods in reference to this. 

Oftentimes when working with a new client I lead them through 7 days of clean eating. In addition to the instant energy and weight loss they experience, clients almost always tell me that their food started tasting different– but in a good way! Their fruit started tasting better and sweeter. Even their greens tasted sweeter! I remember I had a client who was so excited to eat a small piece of dark chocolate at the end of her 7 days of clean eating. She could believe how overly sweet it tasted! This is because our taste buds change over time. 

I saw this because, eating well takes time and patience, but also- the more you eat greens the better they start to taste! Thanks, taste buds, for doing back flips for us. 

But let’s get back to this bitterness factor. When I was being certified as a Junior Sommelier (believe it or not, that’s a thing), we did a lesson on pairings and this idea that certain flavors brought out other flavors and other flavor cut them. Sugar brings out sugar. For instance, if you take a dab of sugar on your tongue and then sip a sweet Riesling wine, it will taste like sugar water!

Lemon and salt CUT. They also happened to CUT the bitterness from GREENS.

Remember this when you’re preparing your vegetables! If they don’t taste stellar, try adding a squeeze of lemon juice and sea salt– it works wonders. I apply this principle below with this DELICIOUS recipe. 

Roasted Veggies and Tahini Lemon Sauce

Ingredients

• 1 head of cauliflower
• 5 carrots
• 5 parsnips
• bunch of curly parsley, chopped
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup tahini (I use Brad’s organic– try to find one that is creamy)
• 1 lemon
• Sea Salt
• Pepper

Directions

1. Preheat your oven to 375deg F
2. Chop up cauliflower, carrots, and parsnips and toss into a bowl.
3. Add olive oil, about a teaspoon of sea salt, and a teaspoon of pepper, and stir ingredients around so the veggies get coated.
4. Spread our veggies onto a large baking sheet lined in tin foil, and toss in oven.
5. Check on your veggies after 30 minutes to make sure they are not burning. I like to move them around with a wooden spoon once or twice to even out the heat exposure.
6. Cook for 45 minutes to an hour, or until they are tender and golden brown, and then pull out of the oven.
7. While these cook you can take your large bowl and toss in the juice of 1 lemon and 1/4 cup tahini. Whisk this a little with our fork.
8. Toss the warm to hot veggies in the tahini lemon mixture and stir around. The heat will cause the tahini to melt down and coat the veggies in an awesome way.
9. Stir in the parsley, and add more sea salt, pepper, or other spices (like turmeric, cayenne, cumin) to taste, and enjoy!

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