CARAVAN

Here's a fun recipe for super healthy, super colorful and super tasty Mini Root Vegetable Latkes or Bird Nests. The three of us developed this dish this past summer when we were looking for something to do with a bunch of extra beets and carrots. Because they're baked and not fried, they require way less work than normal potato latkes, but they're just as satisfying and even more flavorful.

Mini Root Vegetable Latkes

Ingredients:

210g beets, peeled, grated

190g carrot, grated

275g zucchini (cut in half, de-seeded, grated)

60g leeks, minced

75g onion, minced

15-20 g parsley, finely chopped

½ tsp coriander

½ tsp cumin

½ tsp turmeric powder

1+ tsp kosher salt (or fine Himalayan)

4 tbsp rice flour

3 eggs

2 tbsp olive oil

Sesame-Yogurt Sauce

Ingredients:

1 cup whole Greek yogurt

1-2 tbsp toasted sesame oil (to taste)

juice of 1/2 lemon

pinch salt

Instructions:

1. Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Line baking trays with parchment paper.
2. Using the grater attachment on your food processor, grate the beets, carrot and zucchini. Combine in a large mixing bowl.
3. Add the leek, onion, parsley. Mix thoroughly using your hands to distribute the vegetables evenly.
4. Using clean kitchen towels (ideally, ones that you don't mind dying pink) or durable paper towels, expel all the remaining liquid by wrapping the grated vegetables in towels and squeezing all the water out. You'll likely have to do this in several batches. Repeat two or three times until vegetables don't seem to be retaining much liquid.
5. Add spices and salt. In a small bowl, whisk together the rice flour and egg. Add egg-flour mixture to the seasoned vegetables and 1 tbsp olive oil and mix thoroughly.
6. Form the vegetable mixture into small patties; we like them best no more than an inch and half wide in diameter and no thicker than 3/4 of an inch. You don't want the patties to be too packed, but they do need to stick together.
7. Place them on a baking tray, leaving some space in between each.
8. Drizzle a little olive oil on each patty before baking.
9. At 400 degrees, the latkes should be ready after about 20-30 minutes. You can turn them after 20 minutes to get extra crispness on the bottom, but we often skip this step—the top side gets plenty crispy.
10. Serve latkes warm out of the oven if possible, or at room temperature if not. We like to put a dollop of a yogurt or tahini-based sauce on top of the latkes or something herby like a green goddess-type sauce.
11. Garnish with whole parsley leaves and lemon zest.

(For the sauce, combine all ingredients and adjust for taste!)