Roasted Carrots and Mushrooms

November is moving along at lightening speed, I can hardly believe Thanksgiving is only a week away!
The Thanksgiving decorations are up, and I have been gathering ingredients for our Thanksgiving dinner.

November has been full of activity from Election day to the school musical that my son is preforming in last weekend, and this weekend.  This is his first musical play, Annie Get Your Gun, everyone has done such a great job, it was a real treat to watch.

We have had some beautiful fall days recently, with fog and the beauty of the changing leaves.  My husband took this beautiful picture while he was out and about the other day, I think it is so pretty.  I love thick fog and crisp cool air!

Tonight I finally got to try a new recipe for dinner that I have been eager to make.  I had a big bag of carrots in the fridge, as well as a large package of mini portobello, and I knew I wanted to roast them together for a nice fall dinner.  I am really loving roasting veggies this year, it may be my new favorite way to enjoy them!

Here's how I made our Roasted Carrots and Mushrooms.

Preheat oven to 400 F.

First I peeled and cleaned about 10 carrots, then cut them into chunks on the diagonal, Then I put them in my roasting pan and tossed them with olive oil, probably a little more than 1/8 of a cup of olive oil.  Then I seasoned them with sea salt, pepper, dehydrated onions (I love the sweet taste of dehydrated onions), and about 2 teaspoons of McCormick's Tuscan style Italian seasoning (blend of thyme, garlic, marjoram, onion, rosemary, oregano, basil, savory, and sage) you could also add regular Italian seasoning, and a pinch of garlic.  Toss together to incorporate seasoning.  Then start roasting carrots, give the carrots a 15 to 20 minute head start on the mushrooms as they take longer to cook (a tip I read about while reading up on roasting veggies).

While the carrots are beginning to roast, clean and chop mushrooms into quarters (or sixths if they are bigger mushrooms)  In a bowl toss them with a couple tablespoons of olive oil, and more of the same seasonings that went on the carrots, except I left off the salt, as I felt there was already enough in with the carrots.  After the carrots had cooked for about 20 minutes (or until they just start to be a little fork tender), I mixed in the mushrooms and continued roasting until the carrots and mushrooms where cooked to my preference, the carrots were nice and tender.  This took close to an hour.  Different thickness of carrots may cook quicker.

Here's how they turned out.

Our dinner was simple, and the star of the show was our roasted veggies, I served it with keibasa, and some delicious brown and serve warm sourdough baguette that my husband brought home from the store that is made right in Portland, of course with real butter.  Delicious fall meal, the roasted carrots and mushrooms were great!  I think they would be a wonderful side dish to a roast or baked chicken as well, and would even be nice for Thanksgiving.

I hope everyone is having a nice November.  What veggies do you like to roast?