Eat your greens

Remember that line when you were a kid? How many of us hae stared at a plate of "something" that was supposed to be good for us. The problem was, that usually, it didn't look "green." Probably somewhere around brown, or black, or grey, or some other color that just disgusted you to look at it. "And Mom wants me to eat that?"

Again, I wonder how many people never learned to cook because of incidents like that. And I wonder how many parents just discretely pushed their "greens" off their plate, or invoked the "when you're old enough to vote you can decide what you eat" logic (that was the one I got for everything: be it liver, overcooked greens, frozen meatballs, whatever. "when you can vote you can pick what you eat. " What did you get told?).

Well, one thing that I have learned in many years, is that kids are usually right. If the food looks disgusting, it probably is. And nothing is more disgusting than overcooked, boiled, nasty greens. And it has spoiled a really good experience for many people, because the minute they see a "green" of any kind: chard, kale, escarole, spinach, collards, beet greens, you name it, the "YUCH" reaction sets in, and the plate gets pushed away. So, about half of the vegetables you can eat just get marked as "not an option," mentally, and you stick to the old faithfuls, if you eat any vegetable at all (some day, look up the average per capita consumption of vegetables. It is very, very sad).

But I am optimistic. As people have looked at other cultures, or went back to their own, and studied where recipes and techniques have come from, "greens are back." Europeans, who always seem to be right about food, have never had a problem with them. In fact, one of the things I hear from talking to Europeans with children, who move to the United States, is that the kids ate the stuff gladly back home, and now, they just won't touch it.

Well, let's all start eating our greens. Last night, at a dinner party, with some misgivings, I served up plates of escarole, cooked the way I just about always cook greens. I wasn't sure how the vegetable was going to go over. We had a LOT of food to get through, and it WAS greens.

Let me say this at the start: I feel so overwhelmed by my friends at times, and how open they are, how honest they are, and all that. It was a wonderful dinner party, and everyone ate their greens. Now, this was with a substantial plate of ossobuco and risotto, after a little plate of scallops and fennel (and yes, they ate the fennel too), so not only was it gratifying, it was inspiring. Now, I know I can keep on cooking them.

So here it is. I do this with just about every green during the winter, and in fact, during the summer too. Wash the greens. Do not assume that they are clean. Greens grow in bunches, and the dirt can get in "there" and be hard to get out. Washing them is good, too, because the water will help you when you cook them.

After you've washed the green you're using, take a "stem check" By that I mean, is the stem of the plant tender enough to eat (you need to do this on things like chard, and kale, where it frequently is not). If the answer is no, then pull the leaves off of the stem, or if it's a stem that starts tender but gets tough, cut away the tough part. You'll have to do this with things like spinach, and dinosaur kale. You won't have to do it at all for things like escarole. Then, take what you have left, and chop it into bite sized pieces. You will have a lot - or so you will think. Wait until you see how this stuff shrinks.

Get a wide pot or pan, and put in two inches or so of water, and bring it to a boil. When it comes to the boil, add a few teaspoons of salt. Then add some of your greens. Don't overfill the pot, just let them cook down, and add more. Keep on doing that until you've cooked them all. You'll have collapsed the volume by at least 70 percent. Dump them out and let them cool enough so that you can squeeze out the water. It won't take long.

While they're cooling, I get a pan and heat up some olive oil, and add a few cloves (okay, okay, a LOT of cloves), of chopped garlic. I only cook it for a few minutes and then, I'm done. I take that off the heat, and when the greens have been dried, toss them with the oil, and garlic, heating it up if I have to. And you're done. Or are you?

Or are you? because you can add a lot of other things to that hot olive oil. One of my favorites, if we're eating alone, is some red hot pepper. Not a lot, but some. Last night, we ate the greens "Alla siciliana," which means I added pine nuts, soaked salt cured capers, and raisins to the oil. Not a lot of any of them, just enough to make their presence known. Honestly, if you were trying to make this a main dish, you could add some shrimp to that oil (hmmm. That sounds good. it may be a future dish here at home. I like that idea).

Anyway, the message is clear. Eat your greens. You'll feel better about yourself, you may even feel better because they ARE good for you, and you can help to push that per capita up.