Fast, Fresh & Green (12 page)

Serves 3

My friend Randi tipped me off to this quick method for cooking collards. Up until then, I’d been braising them, which is a perfectly fine thing to do with these tough cookies. But how nice to be able to sauté them on a weeknight for a dish that cooks in just a couple of minutes and takes only about 25 minutes total, including trimming and washing the greens. The trick lies in how you cut the collards. If you roll the leaves up tightly like a cigar and slice them across very thinly (the French call this
chiffonade
), you will have something that looks like angel hair—or maybe linguine. Then all the collards need is a quick sauté with garlic and red pepper flakes to make a delicious side. I like to finish them with either Parmigiano-Reggiano or a touch of honey and vinegar.

Collards are such a great source of vitamin C, beta-carotene, calcium, and folic acid that you’ll definitely be happy to add this recipe to your repertoire. It serves two but can easily be doubled to serve four (you’ll only need 3 Tbsp of olive oil). Greens are always good with pork, but these collards would be a tasty weeknight side dish for just about anything. Sometimes I eat them with scrambled eggs on a meatless night.

½ LARGE BUNCH COLLARD GREENS

2 TBSP EXTRA-VIRGIN OLIVE OIL

1 TSP MINCED FRESH GARLIC

BIG PINCH OF CRUSHED RED PEPPER FLAKES

½ TSP KOSHER SALT

½ TSP SHERRY VINEGAR (
optional)

½ TSP HONEY (
optional)

6 TO 8 CURLS PARMIGIANO-REGGIANO (
optional
)

1
Remove the stems
from the collard leaves by holding a stem with one hand and pulling the leaves away from it with the other. Rip the leaves completely in half lengthwise. You should have about 4 oz/115 g of trimmed collards. Rinse the leaves and dry them well. Stack them up on top of each other, roll them up tightly cigarstyle, and, using a very sharp knife, slice them across into very thin ribbons (about
¹
/
₈
in/3.25 mm wide).

2
In a large (12-in/30.5 cm) nonstick skillet
, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook until softened, fragrant, and just on the verge of turning brown, about 1 minute. Add the red pepper flakes, stir, and add the sliced greens and the salt. Cook, stirring to incorporate everything in the pan, until the greens turn bright green (at first) and then a darker green and are somewhat wilted, about 1 minute (don’t cook much longer or they will begin to toughen). Remove the pan from the heat and taste. If you like, combine the sherry vinegar and honey in a small bowl, mix it well, and mix it into the greens. Transfer to a serving dish or dinner plates. Alternatively, skip the honey-vinegar mixture and serve the greens garnished with a few Parmigiano curls.

Serves 2

In its simplest form, sautéed cabbage is a brilliant thing—the kiss of heat transforms this lowly vegetable, giving it a nutty flavor and a pleasant crisp-tender texture. This is why I’ve kept this recipe simple; I really didn’t want to mess with the cabbage flavor much. (It’s so very different from the boiled cabbage you might disdain). But I made two additions—a little sautéed onion and a finish of reduced apple cider (plus a bit of butter!), which don’t complicate things too much. I’ve also added just a tiny bit of vinegar, because cabbage always benefits from an acid boost.

You’ll recognize savoy cabbage by its wrinkly leaves—the outer ones are dark green. I prefer its texture to regular green cabbage. After cutting out the core, slice the leaves lengthwise to get the longest pieces.

½ CUP/120 ML APPLE CIDER

1½ TBSP UNSALTED BUTTER

¼ TSP RICE VINEGAR

1 TBSP EXTRA-VIRGIN OLIVE OIL

½ LARGE YELLOW ONION (
4 to 5 oz/115 to 140 g
),
thinly sliced

KOSHER SALT

8 OZ/225 G THINLY SLICED SAVOY CABBAGE (
from about ½ head, cored
)

1
In a small saucepan
, bring the apple cider to a boil. Let the cider cook (checking frequently) until it reduces to a syrupy consistency (1½ to 2 Tbsp), about 8 minutes. Do not over-reduce. Remove the pan from the heat and add ½ Tbsp of the butter. Swirl the pan until the butter has melted. Add the rice vinegar, stir well, and set aside.

2
Combine the remaining 1 Tbsp butter
and the olive oil in a 10-in/25-cm straight-sided sauté pan over high heat (medium-high if your burners are powerful). When the butter has melted, add the onion and a pinch of salt and sauté, stirring, until the onion is softened and just beginning to brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Add all of the cabbage and ½ tsp salt and stir well. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the cabbage is limp and nicely browned and the bottom of the pan is very brown, about 6 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and let the cabbage sit for a minute or two. The moisture it gives off will help loosen the browned bits on the bottom of the pan. Briefly and gently reheat the cider butter to loosen it. Drizzle it over the cabbage, scraping it all out of the pan with a silicone spatula. Stir and thoroughly combine the cider butter with the cabbage, scraping up any remaining browned bits. Transfer the vegetables to a serving dish.

Serves 3

I know it doesn’t make sense, but brown is actually a good color when it comes to sautéed green vegetables—especially asparagus, which takes on a wonderful nutty flavor when caramelized in a sauté pan. A little bit of pancetta adds extra depth to this quick sauté.

For this recipe, I prefer to use asparagus that are slightly thick. Cutting them on the diagonal makes them look very pretty. When you’re shopping for asparagus, look for tight heads and take a whiff of the bunch. If it’s starting to go bad (which is common in the grocery store, unfortunately), it will smell off and feel slimy. If you have access to fresh local asparagus during the spring, don’t pass it by. It’s a vegetable treat that is worth a detour. If you want to serve four people with this dish, use a large (12-in/30.5-cm) nonstick skillet and double everything exactly.

8 MEDIUM-LARGE ASPARAGUS SPEARS,
ends trimmed or snapped away (6 to 7 oz/ 170 to 200 g trimmed)

1 TSP EXTRA-VIRGIN OLIVE OIL

1 TBSP UNSALTED BUTTER

2 THIN SLICES PANCETTA (
about ½ oz/ 15 g total), coarsely chopped (roughly ½-in/1.25-cm pieces
)

SCANT ¼ TSP KOSHER SALT

½ TSP BALSAMIC VINEGAR

1 TBSP FINELY GRATED PARMIGIANO-REGGIANO

1
Slice the asparagus
on a very sharp angle into pieces that are about 2 in/5 cm long and about ¼ in/6.5 mm in diameter at their thickest point. You’ll get 6 to 7 pieces from each stalk.

2
In a medium (9- to 10-in/23- to 25-cm) nonstick skillet
, heat the olive oil and ½ Tbsp of the butter over medium-low heat. When the butter has melted, add the pancetta and cook until crisp, 3 to 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and transfer the pancetta with a slotted spoon to a paper towel–lined plate. Add the asparagus to the skillet, season with the salt, and return the pan to the heat, raising it to medium-high. Cook, stirring frequently, until all of the asparagus pieces are nicely browned, up to 10 minutes. They will still be firm, but not crunchy. Remove the pan from the heat and add the remaining ½ Tbsp butter and the balsamic vinegar (it will sizzle). Stir right away and keep stirring until the butter has melted. Transfer the asparagus to a serving dish or dinner plates and garnish with the Parmigiano and the pancetta crisps.

Serves 2

Hoorah! There’s finally a great way to cook summer squash, that poor unfortunate victim of too many “vegetable medleys,” in which the overgrown squash is thickly sliced, overcooked, and served in a pool of liquid. Young squash—diced small and cooked fast—are yummy. Even better, if you treat yourself to a really cool hand tool—a julienne peeler, which only costs about seven dollars—you can make the quickest, tastiest squash dish ever.

To make squash “linguine,” peel the squash all the way around until you reach the seed core. The teeth on the peeler cut the squash into thin strips, which not only look beautiful, but cook in a heartbeat. I like to make the longest strips possible by peeling the entire length of squash in one stroke. However, to avoid running the peeler into your fingers, you can do one end of the squash first, flip the squash around, and then peel the other. Your strips will be half as long, but still nice looking.

In this recipe, I quickly sauté the “linguine” in brown butter for a super-fast side dish. You could just wrap it up with salt and a squeeze of lemon, but I’ve added almonds, as nutty flavors pair really well with all squashes. (Hazelnuts are good here, too.) You can substitute zucchini for half of the summer squash, if you like. Serve this with grilled scallops or shrimp.

1½ LB/680 G YOUNG YELLOW (
summer
) SQUASH (
about 4)

2 TBSP UNSALTED BUTTER

2 TBSP FINELY CHOPPED ALMONDS OR HAZELNUTS

1 TSP KOSHER SALT

2 TSP CHOPPED FRESH TARRAGON OR PARSLEY

½ LEMON

1
Wash and dry the squash
and trim off the ends. Using a julienne peeler, peel the squash lengthwise all the way around, dropping the strips into a bowl. Continue peeling until you reach the seed core. Discard the core and peel the other squash in the same fashion. Toss the squash strips and separate any that are clumping together.

2
In a 10-in/25-cm straight-sided sauté pan
, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the almonds and swirl the butter around in the pan. Cook the butter until it reaches a nutty brown color (the almonds should be light brown by then), about 2 minutes. The color turns quickly so keep an eye on it—it will be more flavorful if you take it beyond a very light brown, but you don’t want it to turn black. Immediately add the squash and salt. Toss the squash gently with tongs until it is well coated with the butter. Continue cooking just until the squash becomes slightly limp, about 1 minute. Remove the pan from the heat, stir in half of the chopped herbs, and squeeze a little of the lemon over the squash and toss. Taste and add more lemon, if desired. Transfer the squash to a serving dish or plates and garnish with the remaining herbs.

Serves 3 to 4

Sometimes I prepare sautéed spinach simply with slivers of garlic and a few red pepper flakes. Perfectly delicious but the truth is this slightly richer version, with a bit of cream and Parmigiano, is my favorite. I like the sweet, earthy flavor the sautéed shallots add, too. You could even think of this as a much lighter version of creamed spinach. This spinach would be my top pick for a fast, delicious sidekick to a sautéed chicken breast. The recipe also works well with Swiss chard.

I’m a big fan of fresh spinach (by fresh I mean bunches of leaves on the stem, rather than bagged spinach). I actually enjoy the sort of Zen-like process of stemming and washing the pretty clusters of leaves, but it does make a simple dish more time-consuming than it has to be. You can certainly do this with bagged baby spinach; just look for the bags with larger leaves, which have more body and flavor. If you do buy fresh, you can stem, wash, and dry the spinach a day ahead and keep it in a paper towel–lined zip-top bag.

1 TBSP EXTRA-VIRGIN OLIVE OIL

2 SMALL SHALLOTS,
thinly sliced (about 1½ oz/45 g
)

KOSHER SALT

1 BUNCH FRESH SPINACH (
10 to 12 oz/ 285 to 340 g
) OR 5 TO 6 OZ/140 TO 170 G BABY SPINACH LEAVES,
washed and dried