Who likes broccoli?
or brussel sprouts? Or cauliflower? Oh, sure, lots of people eat it, but frankly, it’s awful. That shit is only useful as a transport device to get something that tastes good into your mouth. Cold, raw broccoli and carrots and etc, is just something you eat after you dunk it in dip; the dip is really what you’re after, the vegetable just allows you to get it into your mouth without getting it all over your fingers. The veggie does add some texture, but usually the texture is ick. Me, I prefer chips.
Cooked veggies, on the other hand, are usually a way toget some kind of butter or other sauce to your mouth, without getting it all over yourself- or for that matter, just drinking the sauce out of a bowl.
No, the Creator has kindly provided us with a method for getting all the nutrients we need from those frankly, disgusting vegetables, and that method involves the lowly hog.
The hog will eat anything. Put a pile of cowshit in front of it and it will eat it. Brussel sprouts? No problem. Brocolli? Yum! Cauliflower? for sure! And it’s not just the good and fresh stuff they like, you can feed a hog veggies so rotten as to be ten times as disguisting as they are fresh. The hog just gobbles it all up.
And what does the hog turn this crap into? Bacon. Ham. Porkchops. Jowls. Trotters. All food that is intrinsically yummy. So what I do, is to let the hog do all the work of eating that crap for me, and I eat the bacon.
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I actually had some brussel sprouts I liked once…but they were cooked in some kind of balsamic/bacon fat method, so they tasted nothing like brussel sprouts.
Indeed! To make that food palatable, you have to disguise it’s intrinsic flavor, which is the flavor of ass.
Do not ask me how I know that.
Never would.
Don’t mind veggies. long as you have some dip. now bacon, needs nothing to be perfect. yum
Well, I’m not a fan of raw pumpkin, either.
They’re palatable and even delicious if they’re cooked properly. The problem is that all of us had badly prepared veggies inflicted upon us as children and those incidents left a painful scar.
And raw vegetables are mostly no fun at all. It’s drudgery as food, not tasty, uncomfortable. Awful.
It’s true that accessories like bacon and cheese can do wonders to make these foods edible. It’s g-d’s way of balancing the scales because all these cruciferous bastards are very good for you.
Proper cooking technique also makes a world of difference. Cooking tames them; cooking them correctly makes them edible.
Brussel sprouts? Buy them raw or simply frozen. (If frozen, let them thaw.) Cut them into quarters and place in cold salted water for a few minutes. Drain and set aside. Finely dice an onion and cut up some slices of bacon into small pieces. Saute in a bit of butter in a skillet until nearly donel the onions will be soft but not brown and the bacon not quite crisp. Throw in some minced garlic and stir for 10-30 seconds. If you smell the garlic, it’s done; watch it, garlic burns easily. Add the brussel sprouts to the skillet; add a bit more butter if needed. Cook over medium heat until the sprouts are barely brown.
You’ll be amazed at how different this tastes from the mess you’re accustomed to facing. This is very good on the side with most any meat.
I recently had a casserole with broccoli, cauliflower and cheese sauce with toasted croutons of bread on top. I almost missed the meat on my plate because this was so very good I couldn’t stop eating it. Same sort of thing; the cut veggies were blanched for a couple of minutes in salted boiling water, then plunged into ice water. Cut some bread into small cubes and place in the oven at 350 for 15 minutes or until crisp. (You can toss with oil and garlic if you like; that helps.) Put the drained veggies in a casserole dish and cover with the sauce (any cheese sauce you like, we make our own and it’s kickass and easy, ask me for the recipe). Top with the bread cubes and dots of butter. Baked at 350 for 25 minutes and then browned under the broiler until the bread was extra toasted, it was rich and crunchy and great.
Cauliflower can be treated like potatoes, including boiling them and then mashing with butter and cream.
A lot of vegetables, especially root vegetables like carrots, turnips, parsnips taste great when pan roasted. You can also throw in onions or shallots and whole unpeeled garlic cloves for extra flavor. Put an empty roasting pan in your oven for 15 minutes at 400. Cut veggies into inch-long pieces, throw some canola or olive oil over, add salt and pepper and any other herbs you like to taste, mix to coat, pour onto a hot roasting pan, roast in the over for 20 minutes or so, checking them and turning them over at least once so all sides get the heat. When you take them out of the oven squeeze the garlic cloves; they will have turned to a paste that only makes everything better. Eat. (Resist the urge to pick pieces out of the pan like candy; you’ll burn your fingers. Take my word for it.)
The Japanese probably have the best way of handling veggies — tempura!
http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1015259-vegetable-tempura
Regardless of what the paleo people may tell you, man is not fed by meat alone. Getting some veggies in from time to time is good for you in most every way. But you shouldn’t have to make faces and choke ’em down, they can be tasty.
Jenny
I have had vegetables prepared by the best restaurants in north America.
Ass flavored, every one.
Vegetables are what food eats, or so I’ve heard.
That said, I dearly do love brussels sprouts, parsnips, turnips and carrots, tossed in vinaigrette and roasted for 25 minutes or so.
My dad would not eat grapefruit. Said “If a hog won’t eat it I won’t either.”
My first job working for a farmer the down the road, was cleaning out pig pens. I’ve watched them drop turds and spin around to eat it before it quits moving.
After telling him about my day, I remember asking dad if he eats what pigs eat, and he about decked me.
heheh…..
All I have to do is smell broccoli, and the entire meal is ruined.
Welcome to the he-man veggie haters club
Mom must have ruined me. I love almost all veggies. Except okra and eggplant, yuk.
I grow my own brussels sprouts and broccoli. Sometimes parsnips, beets and turnips. Parsnips are best peeled, sliced into 1/4″ slices lengthwise, parboiled then fried in butter until browned. They taste better than chocolate cooked that way, especially cold.
“Fried in butter”
Sure, cauliflower is edible with a good cheese sauce, but then what isn’t edible with a good cheese sauce ;-D
When I first married the running joke in her family was “if it’s green Scott won’t eat it”.
When I became a dad I decided to get past it a little bit so I could be a good example to the kiddos.
Now the further 40 gets into my rear view mirror the more I realize I need the fiber.
But you’re right. They’re culinary chores. Not any sort of enjoyment to be had.
Pickled with some hot peppers in the jar and they are pretty good.
Here’s my test: If it doesnt’ taste good unadorned I try hard not to eat it. A steak tastes good by itself. Bacon. Cheese. Chicken. Lamb. Salmon. Tuna. If you have a choice between a slice of fresh tuna and any vegetable and you choose the veggie, there’s something bad, bad wrong with you that probably can’t be fixed.
So, how does bread fit into you equation?
Plain grain or flour is pretty awful but I love bread.
Unfortunately it’s not all that different than sweets metabolically.
My mother had one method of preparing vegetables: put them into a pot of water and boild all the texture and flavor out of them. I was an adult before I realized broccoli could have texture and crunch. Or that Brussels sprouts didn’t have to taste like balls of snot.
Personally I like veggies, and they don’t need to be slathered in sauce. My wife makes roast Brussels sprouts that are wonderful, a little olive oil, then roast until they begin to carmelize.
Not that I don’t enjoy the product of the pig mind you. I just don’t turn my nose up at the veggies on the side.
Olive oil: Fat = flavor. Carmelize: burn the sugars in the plant tissue till they turn sweet. Have some bacon and brown sugar for the same effect, but more so.
Scott — By definition, grains and products made from them aren’t vegetables. So your question is a null program.
Gerry, no okra? You must not be from the South. Fried okra is, I believe, a form of manna. I think it was sent down from Heaven already crispy.
Now, boiled okra may be different. I don’t know: I’ve never eaten it, & never will. That is sacrilege.
I love Brussels sprouts, paired with potatoes & certain meats. They’re little cabbages (ooohh, fried cabbage–don’t get me started.)
I forgot to answer the question at the top of the post: I do. With a cheese or bechamel sauce, or a sour cream product.
I make a great spinach lasagna (with meat, of course). Thought about trying it with broccoli instead. I may yet do it.
And yes, I’m straight as a chalk line.
Readng comprehension fail. How often do you eat them without sauce, cooked or no?