The other title we considered for this blog is “Must love lids.”
Frying greens
Roughage entered my life hard and heavy while cooking and eating in food cooperatives in college. I learned one way to prepare it, usually kale or swiss chard, which was to feed around 100 people at a time - wash it, remove leaves from stalks, chop it. Heat some oil in a giant wok. Toss all your greens in there all at once, salt it, toss it with two huge spoons, keep tossing, reaching down into the wok like you’re scooping up a big pile of laundry from off the ground. There is some steaming involved in this method because the greens were always still wet from their wash.
After college my husband’s Mom bought us tickets to a cooking class in Brooklyn at Sunday Suppers. The class consisted of cooking a dinner together of seared and braised chicken thighs. We made kale to go with it. The method taught was to fry the kale. Heat a cast iron skillet, make it really hot, use a high heat neutral oil like canola in the pan. Put just a few greens at a time in, season heavily with salt, often. Don’t fuss with the greens a lot, let them crisp and pop and brown before you turn them just once. Again, you have to work in really small batches for this. Those greens were delicious but still really chewy, kind of sinewy. Over the years of repeating that method faithfully, they seemed to get more and more sinewy and less good.
A Simple method
Before this year, I experimented just a little. I’ve tried and failed at pan roasting (I don’t know what I was thinking but I wasn’t following a recipe. There’s probably a good way to do this, if you know please tell me). I’ve also occasionally sauteed in olive oil and white wine, again over medium-high heat in a skillet - the result is usually high in acid, usually too much. For a boiled dinner I once boiled the kale, too, which was interesting, and easy to chew, but a little zapped of flavor, and really very wet.
Then this winter I came across a recipe in Canal House Cooks Every Day by Christopher Hirsheimer and Melissa Hamilton. It is not singled out as its own recipe as much as a method included as part of a dinner of steak and french fries, and it is referred to as ‘buttered spinach.’
This recipe has been revolutionary for me because it allows you to walk away from the pan while getting the rest of your dinner ready. The silky, supple greens may not be as dynamic in texture as some hot-fried leaves, but I really don’t find this an issue.
I was skeptical at first because I never use a lid. I was taught in cookery school to never use a lid with any hearty greens because the condensation on the inside of the lid can mute the color of the greens and turn them brown. This has not been my experience with this recipe. I love lids now. They give you control and keep things tidy.
Salad time
I come from a family that eats salad at the end of every dinner. I find it a beautiful marker of the passage of the meal, when it’s salad time. It is a decision that is made as a group, when to commence with the salad course. Actually now that I write that I’m realizing my Mom votes for us all. Usually my Dad is talking to, quite possibly arguing, with my sister or me, and so whichever one of us is less engaged in the dialogue, turns to my Mom and mouths, “salad?” soundlessly, propping up the bowl a little to make clear the pantomime, and she either nods yes or shakes her head no) Sometimes the pause for the simple survey presents an opportunity to raise a new topic for discussion, and to open another bottle of wine. Salad means we are all sitting here for a little while longer, let’s settle in again, but maybe we talked enough about (pick any hot topic) tonight.
I have mostly continued my family’s salad after dinner always tradition, until recently. In the summer I always make at least a little salad, but in the winter I’m finding a lack of energy to chop up a bunch of cold vegetables from the fridge and make a fresh vinaigrette for them. My hands are already cold, I don’t need to be peeling a 39 degree cucumber.
I got to enjoying these greens so much that now I just make a big pile of them to eat like salad at the end of the meal. For instance, if I made pasta for dinner in the past there would be salad as a green veg but it’s very nice to have some hot steamed broccoli rabe in olive oil as an alternative.
Greens
Adapted from Canal House Cooks Every Day
As suggested by Canal House, the greens are wonderful with a chewy steak. Notably, I’ve had them with seared short ribs and polenta, as well as lamb loin chops with potato puree. They are also wonderful with some nicely cooked beans, which have their own chew and pop.
3 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons water
½ pound washed, de-stemmed and chopped hearty greens, like spinach, kale, swiss chard, escarole or Broccoli rabe*
Melt the butter in a large pot over medium heat. Add the greens by handfuls, seasoning with salt, and turning with tongs to coat with butter as it wilts. Once all the greens are in, add the water, cover, and reduce heat to medium-low. Cook until the greens are very silky but not disintegrating, 8 - 12 min. (For those more fibrous greens, like kale, rabe, chard, lean towards the longer end of the cooking time. For escarole and spinach, make it more brief). Remove from the heat. Keep covered until you are ready to serve.
*If using escarole or broccoli rabe I prefer to substitute olive oil for the butter and to toss in a halved clove of garlic.
And to drink:
We recently received a number of fuller-bodied red wines that can match the richness, tannin and iron-density of something like spinach. In particular the Fior di Rosso from Nino Barraco works harmoniously here.
We also have a restock on the Sonoma Mountain Winery Merlot, a new vintage of Rosso di Gaetano from Le Coste, an enigmatic and beautiful Tuscan white wine from Ranchelle called Roccolina, as well as a new red from Caleb Leisure. Lots of inspiring things to drink that work well with wintery dinners.
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