BRILLIANT HONEY MUSTARD PARSNIP BAKE

Just after Christmas I bought a load of parsnips in Tesco that were being sold off for cheap and decided to freeze them to use at a later date. That later date arrived a few weeks ago when I used them to make this delicious honey mustard parsnip bake for a Sunday roast one weekend. I took those parsnips, defrosted them and then baked them in a home made white sauce flavored with honey and Dijon mustard which I topped with a crunchy cheese and onion topping. Parsnips have never been more yummy than this!

Now you can cheat when making this bake by buying a couple of jars of white sauce rather than using the butter, flour, milk and vinegar in the recipe below and just flavor it with the honey and mustard. There is no shame in doing this but there is something very satisfying about making it from scratch and you can also get the thickness of the sauce just right doing it from fresh as well. Jarred sauces can be quite thick so you may still just want to loosen them up a bit with a touch of milk if you find that its not coating the parsnips very well.

You can use potatoes instead of parsnips in this recipe if you are looking for a potato based side dish but that will ramp up the calories in this recipe. Not that this is a particular healthy recipe as it stands what with all the milk which is why its a good idea to use parsnips to at least make it relatively lower in calories compared to using potatoes. You can find dried crispy onions in large super markets and they are great when mixed in with breadcrumb toppings although if you can't find them you can just add a few more breadcrumbs instead to make sure your crunchy topping covers the whole top of your bake. The Parmesan can be left off as well if you wish.

Recipe below will make a enough for 6 good sized portions, perfect on a Sunday for going round the whole family!

Honey Mustard Parsnip Bake

1.5kg Unpeeled Parsnips 

85g Butter

85g Plain Flour

600ml Milk

2 Tbsp Dijon Mustard

2 Tbsp Honey

2 Tbsp White Wine Vinegar

Salt And Pepper To Season

85g Panko Breadcrumbs

25g Grated Parmesan 

25g Dried Crispy Onions 

1. Turn your oven on to 200 degrees (180 fan). Bring a large pot of water to the boil. Peel and chop the parsnips into 2cm cubes and place them in the boiling pot. Bring back up to the boil and then simmer for 5 minutes. Drain and then transfer the parsnips to a large baking dish. Leave to one side.
2. Melt the butter in a pan on a low heat before adding in the flours and whisking constantly for around two minutes. Slowly add in the milk in batches, whisking well after each addition until a smooth sauce has formed.
3. Keep heating the sauce for around 5 minutes until it thickens before removing from the heat adding in the mustard, honey and vinegar and seasoning liberally with salt and pepper. Mix until everything is well combined and then pour the sauce over the parsnips. Stir everything together so all the parsnips are coated in the sauce.
4. In a separate bowl, mix together the panko breadcrumbs, Parmesan and crispy onions and then sprinkle the mixture over the top of the sauce coated parsnips before placing them in the oven to bake for 40 minutes until the top is golden brown and the sauce is bubbling underneath.

Remove the bake from the oven and leave to rest for around 5 minutes before serving to make sure the bake is easy to dish up to your diners. The parsnips in your bake should now be beautifully cooked in that bubbling white sauce which has been flavored with the sweet honey and hot Dijon mustard. It's a flavor combination that works so well with parsnips. The cheese and onion breadcrumb topping adds a crispiness to the bake for an extra dimension of texture that really lifts the dish. What is the one word I would use to describe this honey mustard parsnip bake? Brilliant of course!