Parsley Sage Rosemary & Thyme

Truth be told, these two men were the inspiration for the most delicious meal I've cooked in possibly my whole life.  When I was about 14 years old, I listened to their "Bridge Over Troubled Water" 25 times in a row.  When I was 21, I danced through a grassy field singing "I'm on my way, but I don't know WHERE I'm goin', but I'm on my way.  Takin' my time but I don't know where...."  My mom introduced me to their music the day I bought "Concert in Central Park" - the last time they had sung together, and the month I was born (September 1981).  I thought I would never see them together in my lifetime; I had been born too late.  But I did.  Twice.  During their reunion tour.

I was about as ecstatic as I had ever been in my life.  Not because they were teenage heartthrobs, but because I had fallen in love with their melodies, harmonies, lyrics and cadences.  And while "Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme" was not my absolute favorite song of theirs (but definitely high on the list), it does have the ability to supersede recipe-following and taste-tasting.

The meal idea began to churn when my step-mom and I bought some "baby zucchini," which I had never seen before.  I started imagining how to cook them, and I thought of baking them instead of stir-frying (which is how I tend to cook a lot of vegetables).  Then I imagined a baking sheet full of all colors and shapes of vegetables, sprinkled with great herbs....

A trip to Verona's Thursday farmer's market provided an imagination's worth of vegetables to go along with the baby zucchini...

So I went to work cutting up all these amazing vegetables into the perfect sizes and shapes.  I filled up two baking sheets with the baby zucchini, carrots, little red potatoes (also very cute!), yellow squash, eggplant and cauliflower.  (The corn on the cob was cooked separately.)

And then I went to work creating my dream herb combination: parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme!!!

Ok, so there was no thyme growing in a pot on the deck!  But it was on hand (dried) in my parents' goldmine of a kitchen, and the other three were as fresh and local as humanly possible.  I was stoked!  I don't think I had ever cooked (or eaten?) anything with thyme, and I certainly had never had these four lyrical herbs together in one dish!  Did I need a recipe to verify their flavor meldability?  No, not when they were sung together with perfect harmony in Simon & Garfunkel's famous song.  Even though the song sings of impossibilites, I knew this herbal fusion would more than remedy my desire for a delicious dinner.

So I mixed up those herbs with some olive oil, salt, pepper, chives and garlic and smeared it all around on the veggies.  I thought about squeezing some lime juice in with the mixture, because it's one of my favorite flavors, but I thought it might be weird once it got heated up and cooked.... so I let it go.  Trust S&G.

I covered the sheets with aluminum foil to help them cook a little faster (and perhaps keep them from drying out?).  They still took a little while to bake, probably 45 minutes at 350 degrees F.  Also, I had boiled the carrots in water for about 10-15 minutes while I was cutting up all the other vegetables, because I thought they might not bake as quickly as the other.  It all worked out juuuuust right.

Every single one of those vegetables tasted amaaaaazing!  The baby zucchini were not only sophisticated and intriguing, but sweet and flavorful as well.  The eggplant had that great eggplant taste that doesn't exist when they're raw, you know what I mean?  Carrots, potatoes, squash - great.  And would you believe that the cauliflower may actually have been my favorite?  That simple white brassica is like a snowy cloud that melts in your mouth!

Don't let this small serving on the plate fool you - I'm sure each of us at the table had THREE servings of this size.  But there's more....

Did you forget there was un-husked corn in the picture of goodies from the farmer's market?  In the past I would have thought a dinner with a main dish of "vegetables" with a second dish of "a vegetable" would be... weird or unsatisfying or overkill.  In this case, the vegetables were taking so long to bake that we had the corn as an appetizer of sorts.  My preferred toppings for corn on the cob: lime and salt.  If you've never tried it, I would highly recommend it!  So, by time the veggies were done, our plates were empty - save for lime juice and salt.  So we spooned the baked veggies on top of that accidental concoction and I got to add my beloved lime juice flavor to the vegetable heap after all!  And THAT, my friend, was a very fortunate accident!  The steaming parsley-sage-rosemary-thyme-vegetable conglomeration was perfectly accented by the tangy and cold lime juice.  We even squeezed EXTRA juice on top of the veggies.  It was dee-lish.


Are you going to Scarborough Fair?
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mine


Tell her to make me a cambric shirt
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Without no seams nor needlework
Then she'll be a true love of mine


Tell her to find me an acre of land
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Between the salt water and the sea strand
Then she'll be a true love of mine


Tell her to reap it in a sickle of leather
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
And to gather it all in a bunch of heather
Then she'll be a true love of mine


Are you going to Scarborough Fair?
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mine

I've never been able to figure out what the song means.  Is it "this is impossible" ?   Or is it "nothing is impossible" ?  Is it a hopeful song?  A song of lament?  A song of acceptance?  Just a reflection that isn't meant to portray any meaning beyond the simple fact that emotion is inevitably evoked in its hearing?  I'm not sure.  But one thing I know, this meal is a true love of mine.