December daily: Vegetable dishes

[resonant]

via_ostiense was kind enough to prompt: favorite vegetable dish.

Probably my most-made vegetable dish comes from Emalee Chapman's Fifteen Minute Meals. (This, along with The Enchanted Broccoli Forest, were the cookbooks my mother bought me when I went away to college, and I've used them both literally to pieces.) It's so simple you don't even really need a recipe; you grate a couple of zucchinis (she adds sliced red pepper, but I hate peppers) and sautee them in olive oil with thyme, and then you serve them over pasta with grated parmesan on top. I'd eat this two or three times a week if the rest of the family wouldn't revolt.

As I get older, I get more pleasure from bitter foods, and I've been enjoying the braised cabbage from Cook's Illustrated: you sautee the sliced cabbage in a knob of butter, and when it begins to soften, you add a splash of chicken broth and cover it until it's cooked the way you like it. Thyme, again, is the best herb. Minced parsley right before you eat it.

I love nearly any vegetable roasted with olive oil and salt and pepper. I have a recipe for roasted Brussels sprouts that gilds that lily: you start with a pre-heated pan in a very hot oven, add diced bacon and roast until it renders out some of its fat, take it out and toss with halved sprouts and roast until they're almost done, take it out again and toss with thinly sliced apple and roast until everything's nice and softened, then toss with a tiny bit of white vinegar. It's a lovely combination of bitter, sweet, sour, salty, meaty, fatty ... I kind of want some now. (Can't get anybody else in the family to eat it except a bite or two for politeness.)

Comments

[laurajv]

That Brussels sprouts recipe sounds like N and I would murder a giant pot between us, with beer.

and now I want kapusta, something fierce. My mom's kapusta. mmm.

[resonant]

The recipe I found online calls for bacon and sausage. How can you go wrong?

Squash and broccoli

[realpestilence]

1 tbsp lemon juice
2 tsp honey
1 lb butternut squash, peeled, seeded, and cut into 1/4-inch slices
1 garlic clove, minced
1/4 tsp ground ginger
2 tbsp cooking oil
1 cup broccoli florets
1/2 cup sliced celery
1/2 cup thinly sliced onion
2 tbsp sunflower seeds


Combine lemon juice and honey; set aside. In a large skillet, saute squash, garlic and ginger in oil for 3 minutes. Add the broccoli, celery and onion; cook 3-4 minutes longer or until vegetables are crisp-tender. Add the honey mixture and toss; sprinkle with sunflower seeds. Yields @6 servings.

Re: Squash and broccoli

[resonant]

Oh, dear, this has two of my anathema ingredients (winter squash and sunflower seeds). I have tried so hard to like winter squash! I just can't do it!

Re: Squash and broccoli

[realpestilence]

I'm sure you could substitute something else for it just as easily. Cauliflower?


I'm reading through a bunch of new cookbooks I got, all 30-minute recipes/easy casseroles, etc, and I keep having that problem, too. There's always one thing in the dish that I loathe. OUT IT GOES!

[jesse_the_k]

Do you know why our taste buds welcome the bitter as we age?

I've noticed that many sweet things are too sweet anymore.

[resonant]

I think I read someplace that our bitter receptors die off as we get older, so bitter tastes less bitter to us. I can even find beer palatable now, and I'm loving my coffee, my dark chocolate, and my cruciferous vegetables.

And I hear you about things being too sweet -- it's very strange to eat something you've loved all your life (like Hershey kisses) and go, "Hm, maybe with a mouthful of black coffee this would be OK ..."

[majoline]

Mmmm, cabbage ♥

I don't know, with the exception of broccoli which I still hate, I've loved all veg since I was a wee one, so I can't make any age judgments.

[resonant]

I love broccoli, but I know a lot of people don't. My mother-in-law will only eat it raw.

I hate peppers of all sorts and winter squash, but aside from that, I can't think of any vegetables I don't like. I'm funny about fruit, but vegetables are pretty much universally excellent.

[carolyn_claire]

I have a recipe for roasted Brussels sprouts that gilds that lily:

O.O

*whispers* i have all of those things.

[resonant]

It's so good. You have to have a good heavy baking sheet (or an oven-safe skillet) and quite a hot oven.

For some reason, I've been finding lately that bacon is not releasing as much fat as recipes seem to think it will -- recipes will say, "Pour off all but 1 tablespoon fat," and I'll look in the pan and there's this pitiful little sheen of fat, not even a tablespoonful ... which is all by way of saying that, depending on what kind of bacon you have, you may need to add some olive oil when you add the Brussels sprouts.

[myalexandria]

I think the kind of ludicrously high-quality bacon I've used the last five or six years (farmer's market etc) is leaner than the supermarket kind and renders less fat.

[carolyn_claire]

I had the good fortune (apparently) to fry up a slab of quite fatty bacon, recently, and now have half a little jam jar of bacon fat in my fridge. So guess what I'll be making with my black-eyed peas on New Year's day, thanks to you? \o/

[via_ostiense]

Mmm sprouts! I like to roast mine and then toss them, while still in the hot pan, with a mix of fish sauce, vinegar, garlic, and bird's eye chili. It hits the same mix of sweet, sour, salty, and savory-garlicky flavors as yours, plus heat because I love chilis. If you roast sprouts at 450, they get all crispy on the outside, like chips. :D

[resonant]

I can't handle spicy things (even toothpaste burns my mouth), but otherwise that sounds excellent. Fish sauce is surprisingly versatile!

And, yes, roasting is the way to go with Brussels sprouts, though I've also had success slicing them very thin and sauteeing them with ginger and orange juice. People who hate them have often never had them cooked any way but boiling.

[florahart]

I would eat the hell out of all of these. My kids: not so much.

(I had, on purpose, roasted brussels-and-carrots mixed with sauteed mushrooms and then tossed with s&p and parmesan as a primary component of my (solitary) Thanksgiving meal. It was so good I made it again the next day. Kids: wtf is wrong with you?)

[resonant]

I was specifically asked to bring that Brussels sprout dish to Thanksgiving a year ago. It doesn't travel well -- the sulfur in the sprouts makes itself known as soon as you cover them and let them sit in their own steam -- but I still enjoyed it. The kids mostly served themselves one half of one sprout and then sat there and stared at it.

Your Thanksgiving meal sounds delicious. When my family's away I roast root vegetables for my entire meal, or make mashed turnips-and-carrots with pepper and a scandalous amount of butter.

[myalexandria]

did you like them when you were young? I didn't -- although I think that's partly because everyone overcooked vegetables when I was young, and also started out with old supermarket vegetables instead of really really fresh ones, and brussel sprouts are really pretty vulnerable compared to more forgiving vegetables like, say, carrots. They need to be fresh, and they need to be roasted or pan-roasted, not steamed or broiled, or they're crazy bitter.

[rydra_wong]

There is a pizza place near me that does a beautiful brussels-sprouts-and-pancetta pizza (with chestnuts and rosemary cream).

[resonant]

Wow, that sounds pretty good!

We had pears from one parent and a Zabar's deli collection from the other, and I made a grilled sandwich with slices of pear, corned beef, and Swiss cheese that was similarly unlikely but absolutely amazing.

[myalexandria]

I'm a'gonna come visit you for those brussels sprouts. Got any interesting modernist churches in New Town?

[resonant]

St. Joseph the Worker is right next to our apartment!

[myalexandria]

Right up my alley! It's a date :)

[myalexandria]

their FAQs are fascinating. Why so much about cremation, I wonder?

[toft]

Ooooh, that grated zucchini dish sounds tasty, I'll try that! I bet it'd be nice with lemon juice and pine nuts.