Puréeing Vegetables

Many vegetables make delicious purées to serve with roasts and comforting casseroles. The purées, however, should not be tasteless overcooked vegetable slurries but, instead, light creams retaining flavour and body. Suitable vegetables for puréeing include cauliflower, carrots, swedes, brussels sprouts, parsnips, celeriac, peas and spinach but root purées are best of all.

Often it is nice to combine two vegetables, one of which can be a vegetable that is too watery to purée on its own, but adds good flavour, such as leeks. The mixture of celeriac and potato is a well-known combination but celeriac is also delicious if combined with carrots, parsnips and swedes. Bulb fennel combines well with root vegetables in a purée, or is delicious as a purée on its own or blended with Greek yogurt.