This Vegetable Medley is also known as Batar Da’an in East Timor. It is a veggie-packed side dish filled with corn, onions, butternut squash, and beans/peas. You can eat it as a side or even as breakfast!
Peel the skin off of the butternut squash, then use a knife to cut it into ½” cubes.
Drizzle the cubes with 1 tbsp olive oil, kosher salt and fresh cracked black pepper to taste.
Cook the butternut squash for about 30 minutes, mixing occasionally, until cooked through.
Place a large pan on the stove over medium-high heat. Add another drizzle of olive oil to the pan, then add the onion and garlic. Saute until the onions are cooked and turn translucent.
Add the peas or mung beans, corn, and cooked butternut squash. Season with salt and pepper, add optional spices.
Continue stirring until everything is warmed through. Serve with rice and enjoy!
Notes
Recipe copyright The Foreign Fork. For educational or personal use only.
Pigeon Peas: I had a hard time finding mung beans (the traditional ingredient in this recipe), but I did have a leftover can of Pigeon Peas from when I made Pigeon Peas and Rice from the Bahamas. For this reason, I used pigeon peas in this recipe. If you would like to use the traditional ingredients you can use mung beans. I have found them online for you here.
Corn: I used frozen corn because (again) I had some leftover from making my Creamed Corn in the Instant Pot. You can use frozen corn if you’d like, but if you’ve recently cooked fresh corn on the cob, you can cut off the kernels and use that as well.
Butternut Squash: Using butternut squash here certainly made the dish for me. If you’d like to use another type of squash, feel free to do so!
I added onion powder, garlic powder, and coriander to add some flavor to the vegetable blend. In many of the recipes for Batar Da’an that I’ve found online, spices are not added to the vegetables. If you’d like to remove the spices for the sake of authenticity, you are free to do so! This is why they have been labeled as “optional”.
I have sometimes bought pre-cubed butternut squash when making this recipe as it saves so much time not having to peel and cube a large butternut squash.