Oven Roasted Okra

June: National Okra Month

The lazy days of summer are upon us and we also get lazy about cooking complicated meals around this time of the year. So we keep things simple by oven-roasting seasonal vegetables like okra. We normally don’t go out of our way to make it because of okra’s “slimy reputation”. But because our neighbors and friends give us an abundance of organic okra from their garden and farm, we do not want their hard work of picking the pods to go unappreciated (besides, we are lazy to pick them ourselves, unless we pick them up in packages at the grocery store). We also find the easiest way to cook okra—in the oven. Just trim and toss them with a little olive oil and spices and roast them. Roasted okra is our lazy “ladies’ fingers” recipe post for National Okra Month.  

Recipe

 Ingredients 

• 1 pound of okra
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste
• ½ – 1 teaspoon seasoning blend (see Notes)

Directions

Wash the okra and dry with paper towels. Trim off the top and end of each okra pod. Cut into ½-inch slices.

In a large mixing bowl, mix the olive oil with salt and pepper to taste. Toss the okra in the olive oil mixture. Sprinkle with seasoning blend (optional).

Spread them out onto a foil-lined baking sheet. Bake in a preheated oven at 425 degrees F for 15-20 minutes. Remove from the oven. Serve hot.

 Notes

• We used the Indian seasoning blend of garam masala for this recipe. Use other favorite seasoning blends, such as Cajun/Italian/Mexican, etc., to spice up the oven roasted okra.
• Thanks to our farmer friend Eugene K. for the okra we cooked for this recipe.
• Learn more about the benefits of okra, especially for diabetics, from Healthline.