Gingery Braised Brussels Sprouts

Trial #2 for Brussels Sprouts

I found a recipe for braised brussels sprouts in Fast, Fresh & Green (shout out to my roommie Ang: Thanks for the great book, help yourself to the leftovers!) My rendition was neither fast nor fresh but it is green. The brussels sprouts I picked up (last Monday) were not local, they came all the way from Castroville CA, so one can only guess when they died by harvest. They have been decaying away in my fridge for a week, so its possible they lost some of their nutritional bang. Maybe I am just a slow cook, but it took me about fifty minutes to make this dish. I don't consider 50 minutes to be very fast. They did turn out wonderfully, I am enjoying them more than the roasted with salt version I made last time. (Could it be the 2.5 tablespoons of butter I used?)


I melted butter with some olive oil in a pan, then arranged the brussels sprouts (cut in half) single layer cut-side down. Added some salt. Then cooked them for about 5 minutes until they were browned. Then added some chicken stock, simmered until it reduced down, then added more butter, freshly minced garlic and ginger and finished it off with juice from half a lime.

The Torres

Tonight for dinner I recreated Hoboken Pie's Torres pizza that I tried a few weeks ago at Bennu Coffee. I know it isn't exactly a veggie dish, but it does have spinach in it! I used Central Market's pizza crust and made a white garlic-parmesan cream sauce which was topped with Anjou pear slices, applewood smoked bacon, sundried tomatoes, spinach and gorgonzola cheese.

I'm not listing any nutritional facts for this creation. I'd rather be in the dark. I doubt the 4 leaves of spinach per slice of pizza offer a significant amount of nutrients.

Kale

For dinner tonight I made kale, cabbage and chicken. Vegetables take a long time to prepare. I probably wound up using about a dozen different pots, pans, bowls and dishes to prep and cook these three menu items. It was worth it. The kale turned out amazing. I should have tried a piece of it by itself, because in the finished dish I couldn't distinguish the kale flavor from the rest of the ingredients I mixed in with it. I have heard that kale has a strong bitter taste. I blanched it, then sauteed it with some garlic in olive oil, then tossed it with strips of basil, toasted pine nuts, and shredded parmesan cheese. I will definitely be cooking more kale soon. I also made some savoy cabbage. I picked up a little baby head from the farmer's market on Saturday. I simply sauteed garlic and green onions in olive oil then added the cabbage and a little bit of water. I liked it, but not as much as I liked the recipe I used last time where the browned bits of caramelized onion and cabbage with the slight sweetness of the apple butter made a delicious combination.

Nutritional Facts
Kale gets Bowden's red star denoting the fact that he considers it to be a superstar, for its unique combination of nutrients. Among the vegetables Kale scored #1 on the ORAC (oxygen radical absorbance capacity) test, a testing procedure used by the USDA to calculate the antioxidant capacity of fruits and veggies.

In addition to all of the antioxidants, Kale is a form of cabbage that is in the brassica family meaning it contains cancer-fighting indoles.

Kale also has calcium, iron, and vitamins A, C and K. It contains beta-carotene, lutein, and zeaxanthin which all protect the eyes.

2 cups of kale has about 4 g of protein and 3 g of fiber.

Nutritional Information from:
Bowden, Jonny, and Jonny Bowden. The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth: the Surprising, Unbiased Truth about What You Should Eat and Why. Gloucester, MA: Fair Winds, 2007. Print.

Sneak Peek

I know I have been majorly slacking on my veggie trials. Not only have I not been experimenting with new veggies, I have also not been eating healthy due to my fast-paced stress filled life. Excuses, excuses...everyone's life is busy and stressful at times. Filling myself with healthy foods will probably help to energize me better than the caffeine and other junk I've been using as of late. I've been eating out more than I would like to. I haven't been picking the best menu items either. I stopped at a donut shop on the way to school last week and got a vanilla rainbow sprinkles donut and a sausage-cheese kolache (which turned out to be one of those cheese injected hot dogs wrapped in a shiny buttery roll).

Monday was day 1 of spring break. I made it to the grocery store and bought lots of good stuff (including vegetables). I had to get some hot cross buns, does anyone else remember that rhyme? They were sampling Michael Season's natural gourmet baked cheddar cheese puffs (wheat and gluten free! 65% less fat! Real cheese!) Less fat than what? Use of a comparative adjective without specifying what is being compared, big no-no! Nevermind. I found the answer the 'baked' puffs are compared to the 'ultimate' puffs (same brand). Real cheese? As opposed to the 'unreal' cheese found injected in the hot dog of my kolache. Seriously, those cheese puffs are good, the bag is just about gone. I mean good tasting, not so sure they are good for me. They've got to be better for me than my childhood addiction to cheetos.

Here's some of the veggies I picked up for this week.

Twofer Tuesday: Gold Beets and Fennel

March is off to a good start! Two veggies in one day. I foresee myself not having much time to cook this week. Now my fridge is full of leftovers to get me through it. The gold beets were a beautiful bright orange color with the skin on, and underneath a rich golden yellow. I couldn't taste a difference in the flavor compared to red beets. I enjoyed the fennel more than I was expecting to, since I'm not a huge fan of anise-flavored foods. I sliced it horizontally, drizzled olive oil in the dish, sprinkled it with salt, pepper and parmesan and then roasted it in the oven. The raw fennel smelled pretty strongly of licorice, but the scent and flavor was mellowed out after cooking. The licorice flavor was very slight (maybe because I roasted it and roasting tends to mellow most veggies out?)

My delicious (and healthy) dinner was followed up by a mango for dessert. nom nom nom.

I remembered to take 'before' pictures this time!
Gold beets & Fennel

After using the peeler, I read that the outer skin comes right off the beets with ease after roasting. Next time I will save myself from the hassle of using the peeler.


The plated meal: chicken with a balsamic marinade, roasted gold beets with a sherry-balsamic-walnut vinaigrette, and roasted fennel with parmesan.

Nutritional Facts:

Beets are loaded with potassium. A high potassium-to-sodium ratio is ideal for our health, as it reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease. Having a two-to-one ratio of K+ to Na+ may be more important than exactly how much sodium is in your diet. It is recommended to consume daily no more than 2300 mg of sodium and 4700 mg or more of potassium. Two average sized beets have 528 mg of potassium. They also have some magnesium and vitamin C.

Fennel is native to the Mediterranean region; fennel is the Greek word for marathon. That legend about the guy who ran all the way from Marathon to Athens bringing news of the Persians' defeat was running from a town named after this plant that grows there. Anethole is the compound in fennel that gives it the licorice scent and flavor. In animal studies anethole has reduced inflammation and provided anti-cancer benefits. It is also a good source of vitamin C, fiber, potassium and folate.

Nutritional Information from:
Bowden, Jonny, and Jonny Bowden. The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth: the Surprising, Unbiased Truth about What You Should Eat and Why. Gloucester, MA: Fair Winds, 2007. Print.