Thanksgiving! (part 3)

What's a gathering without a vegetable tray?

I wanted to make a slightly unexpected vegetable tray this year instead of the typical raw carrots, celery, etc with a store bought vegetable "dip" or ranch dressing thing. One of the easiest yet best things I've "discovered" lately is aioli, which is garlic mayonnaise. I still haven't taken the step of making my own mayonnaise yet--I keep telling myself I will someday. It just doesn't seem that essential when plain old store bought mayo like Hellman's is already so good. But who wants to dip their vegetables in just plain mayo? (Well, I probably would, but I really like mayo.) I learned to make it a million times more delicious and addictive by simply adding some raw garlic (minced/crushed into a paste), fresh lemon juice, and a little bit of salt. Just a few things and it really is amazingly tasty and addictive (the only drawback I suppose). I also wanted to add some vegetables to the tray that might not normally be on a typical veggie tray but would be delicious with aioli, so I choose broccoli, green beans and cauliflower, all of which might be a bit iffy/objectionable completely raw, but taste great when blanched just long enough to be slightly cooked but still crunchy and to lose any offpputting raw taste. By themselves, they're tasty as is. With aioli, they're fantastic, and still relatively healthy, at least. Better dipping green beans in aioli than frites, right?