Follow our easy, step-by-step, photo illustrated recipe for preparing this delicious medley of summer vegetables. We’ve got squash, zucchini, tomatoes, potatoes and onions, topped with a little cheese to make a delightful display of summers best offerings. Printable recipe included.
Summer Vegetable Casserole Recipe
Squash, Squash, and more Squash. If you’ve ever tried to grow any, you know it can be one of those abundant vegetables that just seems to keep on producing. What to do with all of it?
Here’s a great dish, that’s much easier to prepare than it might look, that will help you enjoy more of your favorite summer vegetables. Squash of course. And, it has some other favorites as well, like tomatoes, potatoes, onions and a little garlic.
Our friends over at OXO Good Grips invited me to participate in another review of one of their products, and I knew exactly what I wanted to make with it.
In this recipe, we test and review the OXO Good Grips Chef’s Mandoline 2.0.
I have several mandolines in my kitchen, but this one beats them all. It’s larger, and much more versatile than the others, even if a couple of them are OXO products as well.
You may recall we recently reviewed the OXO Grate and Slice set, which I really liked. But, this Chef’s Mandoline will be my main go to in the kitchen from now on. Having worked in a commercial kitchen in years past, I just really like the look and “feel” of this one. I think you will too.
As always, the comments and opinions expressed in these reviews are my own. OXO provided me with the Chef’s Mandoline to review and keep, but I wasn’t paid for any endorsement of the product.
While you can make this dish using a knife, the Chef’s Mandoline just made quick and easy work of slicing up the vegetables for this casserole. It’s got lots of cutting thickness sizes to select from, and several variations of cutting blades that let you make straight cuts, wavy cuts, julienne and French Fry cuts, and more. 21 variations in all.
While this dish is certainly very tasty, it’s all about the presentation. Just imagine the looks on your families face when you sit this out on the table. They’ll think you slaved for hours over it, but that will just be our little secret.
I’m sure you can also come up with lots of variations on our Summer Vegetable Casserole. I’ll be interested in hearing your input in the Comments section below.
Thank You OXO for adding another great product to my collection of kitchen tools. It’s always a pleasure to work with you.
So, if you’re ready to slice up some veggies, let’s get in the kitchen, and… Let’s Get Cooking.
Summer Vegetable Casserole: You’ll need these ingredients.
Begin by washing all the vegetables under cool running water. Set aside to dry.
We’ll be using our OXO Good Grips Chef’s Mandoline Slicer 2.0
It consists of the main body unit, the food holder (left front) slicing blade, and manual.
This unit will let you make 21 different cuts with thickness settings in 0.5-mm intervals. The double sided slicing blade has a straight edge and a wavy cutting edge. The unit boasts built-in julienne and French Fry blades as well. The OXO Chef’s Mandoline allows you to easily make precise slices for professional quality results.
It’s suggested that you wash the slicing blade by hand, but the rest of the Mandoline can easily be cleaned in your dishwasher.
See it yourself, visit this link on the OXO website for more information: OXO Good Grips Chef’s Mandoline Slicer 2.0.
Here’s a closer look at the cutting blade. It’s super sharp, so you have to always use caution when working with a Mandoline. The left side allows for regular cuts, while the wavy side on the right makes those ripple type cuts.
The blade easily slips into the main body of the Mandoline. You flip it over to use the wavy cutting edge. I’m going to be using the regular straight cutting edge for most of this recipe.
The new indicator window on the Chef’s Mandoline makes it super easy to select the thickness that you want to cut your vegetables. Just turn the dial to select. The settings on the far right, labeled as 6 and 3, bring up the julienne cutting blades or French Fry blade. Pretty simple huh?
Any round vegetables you will be cutting should be cut into halves first.
Cut up the onions first so you can start them cooking while you slice the other vegetables.
After using a knfe to slice the onions in half and removing the outer skin, I ran them across the Mandoline using the julienne cutting blade. I was curious how it would turn out, but as you can see, I got a variety of sized pieces.
Place the onions in a skillet over medium heat on your stove top.
Drizzle about a Tablespoon of Olive Oil over the onions.
The onions will need to be cooked until they are soft and translucent. I reduced the heat a notch or two once the pan got hot. You don’t want to cook them too fast or they will burn. You’ve got time to just let them cook slowly while you slice the rest of the vegetables.
Chop or mince your garlic. Set it aside for right now.
This is the underside of the food holder.
As you might be able to see, it’s spring loaded. That circle in the middle looks like it has dots on it, but those are raised points that grip the vegetable that you’re slicing. It’s large enough to let you cut a wide variety of vegetables.
Select the thickness of slice you desire, then place the vegetable on the Mandoline. Slip the Food Holder down over the top of the vegetable.
Press the food holder down over the vegetable to be sliced.
Use one hand to hold the handle on the body of the mandoline, then slide the food holder forward to make the cut.
Again, you want to use caution anytime you’re using a mandoline. Those blades are super sharp.
Did I mention that already? Smile.
In less time than it takes to say OXO Good Grips Chef’s Mandoline Slicer 2.0, you’ll have completely sliced up your squash. Don’t you just love the consistent look of those slices? I sliced them on the 1/4 inch thickness setting.
Because they will take longer to cook, I sliced the potatoes thinner. I turned the dial back to 1/8 thick for these.
Then I had to play a bit. I tried out the waffle cutter and the ridges cutter. I’ll be frying up some potatoes real soon with this. Maybe I’ll even make some homemade potato chips. Sound good?
I’ll get better, but I really didn’t have but a minimal amount of waste from my vegetables.
Add the garlic to the onions once the onions are tender and translucent.
Let this cook for just about two minutes longer. Don’t let the garlic burn.
Lightly grease a 8×8.5 inch casserole dish, or something similar in size.
(I’m using my OXO Baking Dish above.)
Spread the onion and garlic mixture in the bottom of the dish.
As you can see, I’ve already got all my other vegetables sliced and ready for assembly. The onions only took a few minutes to cook, which was plenty of time to slice up all the other items needed for this recipe.
Figure out some order to stack the vegetables in. Just build a stack of all four vegetables, then stand them up in the casserole dish on top of the onions.
This part really goes faster than you might think it would, and it makes for such a nice presentation of all your summer vegetables. Your casserole is sure to be the hit of the family get together. You can thank me later. Smile.
Don’t you just like the way this looks already?
Add a little black pepper to the top of the vegetables.
Add a few shakes of salt.
Then add some Thyme.
Finally, drizzle the top with a Tablespoon or two of Olive Oil.
Cover the dish with aluminum foil.
Place the covered dish in a oven that has been pre-heated to 400F degrees.
Let this bake for about 30 minutes or a little longer. It’s done when the potatoes are tender. Yep, you’ll have to sample one to be sure. Don’t burn your tongue though.
When the potatoes are tender, remove the dish from the oven.
Remove the foil, then sprinkle the cheese on top of the vegetables.
Add the bread crumbs if desired. This part is optional. I had them, so decided to use some for a little crunch in the recipe.
Place the dish back in the oven – UNCOVERED – for about 10 more minutes. You will want the cheese to be melted and just starting to turn a little brown before you remove it.
Serve warm and ENJOY!
