Why can’t vegetables be plentiful and yummy all year long? I don’t know, but I intend to enjoy them while they’re around. This Summer Vegetable Tian is the perfect easy side to showcase the medley of delicious vegetables the summer has to offer.
I like to enjoy the natural subtle flavors of vegetables. I’m not all for frying or smothering with thick, rich sauces, but sometimes I want something a little more. This Summer Vegetable Tian lands half way between both worlds. The vegetables are sliced thin, seasoned only with a little salt, pepper, and thyme, and then topped with just a small amount of flavorful cheese. Roasting the vegetables magnifies their flavor and gives them just a hint of sweetness. It’s veggietastic.
Creamy cheeses work really well with this dish but I happened to have a four cheese Italian blend on hand so I used that.
This post contains some affiliate links, which means that we make a small commission off items you purchase at no additional cost to you.
Summer Vegetable Tian
Servings 6Ingredients
- 1 medium yellow onion ($0.42)
- 2 cloves garlic, minced ($0.16)
- 1 Tbsp olive oil ($0.11)
- 1 medium zucchini ($0.75)
- 1 medium yellow squash ($0.56)
- 1 medium potato ($0.77)
- 1 medium tomato ($0.71)
- 1 tsp dried thyme ($0.10)
- Salt & pepper ($0.05)
- 1 cup shredded Italian blend cheese ($1.40)
- 1 Tbsp chopped parsley, optional garnish ($0.08)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Dice the onion and mince the garlic. Sauté the onion and garlic with olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat until the onions are soft and transparent (about 5 minutes).
- While the onion and garlic are sautéing, slice the zucchini, yellow squash, tomato, and potato thinly (1/4-inch slices). Make sure the potatoes are very thin so that they soften quickly while in the oven.
- Coat the inside of an 8×8″ casserole dish with non-stick spray. Spread the sautéed onion and garlic in the bottom of the dish. Arrange the other sliced vegetables, stacked vertically like dominos, in an alternating pattern. Season the top of the vegetables generously with salt, pepper, and dried thyme.
- Cover the dish with foil and bake in the preheated oven for 30 minutes. Remove the foil, top with the shredded cheese, and bake without the foil for an additional 15-20 minutes, or until the cheese is golden brown. Top with chopped fresh parsley for garnish, if desired.
See how we calculate recipe costs here.
Nutrition
Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!How to Make a Vegetable Tian – Step By Step Photos
Begin by preheating the oven to 400ºF. Dice one yellow onion and mince two cloves of garlic. Sauté the onion and garlic with 1 Tbsp olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat until soft and transparent.
Place the sautéed onion and garlic in the bottom of an 8×8 (or similar size) casserole dish.
Wash one potato, zucchini, yellow squash, and tomato to remove any dirt or debris.
Slice the vegetables into 1/4-inch thick slices. The tomato and potato had very large diameters compared to the squash, so I cut them in half before slicing to make them a more similar size.
Layer the potato, zucchini, yellow squash, and tomato in the dish over the onion and garlic in an alternating pattern. It doesn’t need to be pretty, just squeeze them in there any way you can.
Season the top of the vegetables generously with salt, pepper, and dried thyme. Cover the dish with foil and bake for 30 minutes in the preheated oven.
After baking for 30 minutes, remove the foil and top with about 1 cup of shredded Italian blend cheese. Return the Summer Vegetable Tian to the oven (without the foil) and continue to bake for another 15-20 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and golden brown.
Top with a little fresh chopped parsley for garnish, if desired.
Helllooooo gorgeous.
Original Photos
Hiya! I discovered your website yesterday and I’ve already pinned around 30 recipes, hahaha! I apologize if this question seems rather dumb:by creamy cheese do you mean cheese such as goat cheese and cream cheese, or cheeses such as mozzarella?
Thank you!
Something more like mozzarella :) And it’s not a dumb question!
Absolutely love this recipe. Its so versatile and you can use different different veggies, I happened to have 2 potatoes, 2 red bell peppers, 2 zucchini, and 1 onion which I sliced into rings instead of chopped and just layered along with the other veggies. This dish looked so impressive and was very simple. I will be making this again, many times.
I am in the middle of making this right now but omitted the tomato since no one in my family likes them…however I am 25 minutes in to cooking it and it is not even CLOSE to being done… I added a tiny bit of water to replace what I would expect the tomatoes to give off…. any ideas?
Cooking time will vary depending on how thick the vegetables are cut and how tightly they’re packed in… just keep checking every ten minutes. They will eventually soften! :)
I usually cook mine 60 minutes under the foil, top with cheese, bake another 15 minutes uncovered. I skip the tomatoes and use sweet potatoes instead of regular potatoes. I’m actually making it now. I put it in at 6:15, will put cheese on at 7:15, then eat it 7:40 or so tonight!
Tried this dish for the first time the other day. LOVED IT! I never much cared for squash or eggplant, but I added them both to my dish and I now love them.
I did as someone else mentioned and poured the water from the dish about midway through.
This dish is a keeper.
I made this yesterday and loved it! I seasoned the veggies before assembling- just wish I’d thought of using a Ziploc bag ;)
Definitely a keeper!
This was sooo good! I love the fresh flavors!
i changed up the recipe a bit, only had a 6×8″ pyrex and i used a convection oven around 390 degree temp, i increased the time to about 35 mins with the foil and 25 after removing. was worried about it being too watery so i poured a bit of the fluids out before adding the cheese and moving it back to the oven.
while it might undermine some of the “budget” aspect, i used some sesame oil and sesame seeds and caramelized the onion a bit more than suggested, and rubbed the pyrex with margarine. also i topped it with a bit of grated parm as well as mozzarella (only thing i had on hand).
had to baby it a bit but worth the effort, i am genuinely surprised how well it turned out for a first try. for those saying it is watery, i had good luck just pouring some out halfway through, although next time i might try a more potato heavy mix to soak up some of the juices, or mess with the foil/nonfoil cook times.
i’m trying to add more veggies to my diet and never guessed they could taste this good, a few sprinkles of tobasco and this is amazing. going to grab seconds now!
After all these years this recipe is still the bomb. Sometimes I would use cucumbers in place of zucchini so others can try that as well. Also, the prices seem like they may need an update.
I love the colours, it looks gorgeous!
Made this tonight and used oregano instead of thyme. It was so good :)
Does anyone know the nutritional value of this dish?
WOW. My life will never be the same again. Not only is this dish beautiful to look at, the taste is phenomenal!
Some notes that I made:
– My potato and tomato were much larger in diameter than the zucchini and squash so I cut them into half rounds. That made it all a bit more uniform in size and gave it a good ratio.
– In order to keep my dish from being soggy I removed the tomato seeds. This certainly didn’t take from the flavor.
– This dish doesn’t keep well as leftovers unfortunately. So make sure you have plenty of people to help you eat it!
I put a dry herb stuffing mix with sprinkle of olive oil and the parm cheese on bottom. It absorbed vegie juices and was very tasty.
Hey if you are on a low carb diet or a low fat diet instead of olive oil you can use i cant believe its not butter spray butter and instead of potatoes you can use eggplant just a thought for all of us who battle carbs and starches
Hey, Is there anything I can use as a substitute to the onion? I have an allergy to onion, and I would really like to try this.
Maybe mince up a little extra garlic. Otherwise, it should be fine without the onion. :)
Hi, can I replace the yellow squash with an eggplant? :)
Yes, eggplant would work well with this dish.