Are you looking for an easy and delicious rutabaga recipe? First off - make sure you have an actual rutabaga, not a turnip! I find this is one of the most common mistakes out there and have actually seen rutabaga/turnip mislabeled at the grocery store!

Rutabaga VS. Turnip

While rutabaga and turnips look very similar, these root vegetables are actually different in many ways. Rutabaga are larger than turnips and have a more yellow/orange hue where turnip is white. Rutabaga is more dense and harder to cut, turnip is a bit lighter and can be eaten raw. You can make fries out of both, but the rutabaga holds that “french fry” shape better than turnip which can lose their shape and get soft after roasting.

You’ll find your rutabaga has a thick/waxy coating on it and you will want to carefully cut that away with a sharp knife before using. Most turnip skin can be peeled with a regular vegetable peeler or you can even eat the skin.

Additionally rutabaga has slightly more calories, carbs and fiber than turnip. They are both excellent choices when it comes to choosing a root vegetable, but this recipe definitely works best with rutabaga.

You can find my favorite air fryer turnip fries recipe here.

Tips for baking your rutabaga fries

I’m definitely a big fan of parchment paper when it comes to roasting veggies and it is an essential part of this recipe. The maple syrup will caramelize (please make sure you are using REAL maple syrup!) as it cooks and using parchment paper will make clean up so much easier!

When cutting your fries, try to make them uniform in size and thinner fries will cook more evenly. If you have too much variety in the size of your fries, you will find some cook well and others will be raw inside.

What to serve with maple roasted rutabaga fries

Honestly, these are such a fun side dish and go with almost anything, here are two of my favorites:

• Almond-Crusted Chicken Fingers

• Maple Mustard Salmon