Soil and Plant Society

Unusual Veggies: Recipes and Cooking Guide

How to Prep New Veggies – Crash Course

Trying new things can be daunting, especially if you’re not confident in your cooking skills. Luckily there are some pretty simple methods in corporate more veggies in your life!

Steam: Ideal for green veggies like broccolini, broad beans, peas and green beans as well as some of your root veggies like sweet potato and carrots. Be sure to account for the density of whatever you’re steaming as that will decide the cooking time. Cook until a knife can pierce through without too much resistance (we don’t want mush though; undercooked green veg isn’t the worst and will continue to cook in the bowl until serving.

Steaming is great way to savour the flavour of veggies and can be good to soften a dish with very powerful flavours like curries or tagines.

Another way to serve steamed veg is with salt garlic and oil, a family favourite of mine is green beans steamed then tossed in good olive oil, salt and a small clove of fresh garlic.

If you want to cook out the garlic a bit, you can dump the hot beans on top of the garlic and let them sit for a few minutes with a lid, then add your oil, salt, and toss. Or add the garlic on top of the beans in the steamer in the last few minutes of cooking, just be sure that you don’t lose the garlic down the steamer holes.

You can also steam things on top of whatever you’re cooking. I like to add beans or okra on top of a curry that’s simmering on the stove before I need to serve, without mixing let them cook with a lid on. Once cooked, fish them out separately and serve alongside the curry. This is a good way to cook with less mess but also avoids overcooking veggies when reheating leftovers, just be sure to add enough for one serve at a time.

Pan fry: This suits your leafy greens the most (I tend to find that leaves clump together when steamed) as well as other firmer green veggies like okra, asparagus and broccolini. With anything pan fried you want your ingredients to be as dry as possible, leafy greens will let go of their moisture when cooked, so make sure they’re dry before adding them to the pan to ensure you don’t end up with a waterlogged pan. I like to use a salad spinner to try things like leafy greens but also beans and okra.

Flavouring panfried veggies is done in the pan rather than separately but be careful with your timing! Fresh garlic generally is added last as it can burn very easily! If you are doing leafy greens which have tougher stems you should prepare them separately and cook the stems for a few minutes before adding the leaves.

For something like asparagus, I like to use ghee and olive oil together, get the pan nice n hot. Dump in my asparagus and a light dusting of salt. After an initial agitation I let the asparagus sit to get some colour before shaking the pan again. Repeat until pretty much all sides are browned (max 3 mins). Add in some garlic (add extra oil or ghee if your pan is looking a bit dry). Mix that around, once its starting to brown, add in the juice of half a lemon. Shake the pan and make sure its all combined and serve! This method also works great for okra and zucchini.

 If you’re worried about oil splattering there’s two things you can do other than making sure your ingredients are very dry.

  1. Dump all you veggies in at once and immediately agitate the pan before covering with a lid (keep it slightly open, watch out for condensation when you lift the lid). If they’re leafy greens you want to add as many is as possible, so they smother any splashing oil, keep mixing them around so they don’t overcook. Or add the below item to your kitchen!
  2. Buy yourself a splatter guard, you can get them quite cheap from places like Daiso or buy them from your local Asian grocer, make sure it will cover the top of your pan (bigger is fine, but too small doesn’t really work).

Roasted: Many of your tougher and denser veggies do well roasted. There’s a few things that can impact how you go about cooking your veggies.

Sugar content: Veggies high in sugar tend to go from browned to black quicker than you would expect. Some of the usual suspects include sweet potato, pumpkin and carrots. Veggies low in sugar tend to take a while to brown but when they do they often taste better with deeper browning. This includes brassicas like brussel sprouts and cauliflower, potatoes, parsnips and swede.

Density & surface area: This impacts cooking time and browning. As an example, pumpkin is quite dense, so it needs a longer cooking time unless you chop it into small pieces, but then it starts falling apart quite easily. Pumpkins are also high in sugar and so tend to caramelise quickly when in the oven. A way to cook a large piece of pumpkin is either low and slow or covered with foil to steam the pumpkin, cooking it through the middle before removing the foil and browning the outside. Surface area is essential for maximising the browning and crispiness of your veggies, Brussel sprouts are an excellent example of this! https://www.seriouseats.com/easy-roasted-brussels-sprouts-food-lab-recipe

Seasonings and Oil: While adding things like garlic rosemary and thyme to your roast potatoes sounds like a great idea the reality is that all these things burn very easily and end up as bitter, charred bits on your lovely crispy potatoes. A way to get around this is to either use dried flavourings like dried herbs and garlic powder, or, infusing flavour into the oil before you roast with it.

If you want a few tricks for the best potatoes check out this recipe here! https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-roast-potatoes-ever-recipe                        

You can make up a large batch of oil and freeze it into cubes for future roasts!

Serious eats is one of my go-to websites for when I don’t know how to prepare something! They have some excellent guides for fruits and veggies that go behind the why of the how and what.

This is what makes cooking seem so intuitive for some people! They’ve learnt the reasoning behind methods and tricks, this knowledge tends to be widely applicable to multiple methods and ingredients.

 

Tofu Stuffed Bitter Melon (see note 3):

Ingredients:

  • Neutral oil.

Melon Ingredients:

  • 1 medium or 2 small Chinese bitter melon with the seeds and pith removed (pale inner part) cut into 1 cm rings (about the thickness of your pinkie finger). Pop these in a large enough bowl that you can mix them around.
  • 2 tablespoon of salt.
  • 1 tablespoon of corn flour (corn starch) + extra for dusting.

Stuffing Ingredients:

  • 250g Firm Tofu, mashed or broken up into fine crumbs. If your tofu is quite wet you may need press out the excess water (see note 1 on how to do this). Put the tofu into a large mixing bowl. Measure and add in the following to this bowl:
  • 1 clove of garlic and 1 similarly sized bit of ginger minced or grated.
  • 1 teaspoon corn flour (corn starch).
  • ½ teaspoon of white pepper
  • ½ tablespoon soy sauce
  • ½ tablespoon oyster sauce (vegan optional)
  • 4 Dried shitake mushrooms rinsed off and then soaked in 250ml of hot water (in a heat safe jug or bowl) for at least 2 hours beforehand or until fully hydrated.

Do not throw the liquid away after the mushrooms are done!

Mince the mushrooms into fine pieces (not super fine but no large chunks).

  • A small bunch of garlic chives, washed, dried off (see note 2) and finely diced.
  • (Optional) Chilli (finely minced).

Sauce Ingredients:

  • 2 teaspoon of corn flour (starch) mixed together with 2 teaspoons of water. Set aside. (See note 4)
  • Add the following ingredients to the leftover mushroom soaking liquid:
  • 2 tablespoon of oyster sauce (vegan optional)
  • 1 tablespoon of soy sauce
  • ½ teaspoon of sugar or alternative sweetener, or to taste (see note 5).
  • Another small piece of grated ginger (or more, up to you!)

Serve with:

  • Snow peas or green beans can be added to the pan with the sauce and bitter melons just before serving. Ensure there is still enough liquid that the sauce will not boil dry and add them on top followed by a lid. Cook until fork tender but still crisp (around 3-4 mins for snow peas and 6-8 mins for green beans).
  • Rice

Steps:

  1. Ideally before you start cooking you have read through the ingredients and the method so that you can prepare all your ingredients and equipment and have them ready to go when you need them. If you haven’t gotten everything prepared yet, stop and please do so now!
  2. Add the salt to your bitter melon rings and toss to ensure all rings are evenly coated.
  3. Lay out your rings on a plate or tray covered with paper towel or with a clean tea towel. Leave for an hour to allow for excess water to seep out while you prep the filling.
  4. You should have most of the filling ingredients already in the bowl, add in your mushrooms and chives. Using your hands mix everything up until it is all well combined (glove up or use a spatula if you’d like to), you can use the chives as a good indicator of ingredient dispersal. This can be made the day before and kept in the fridge for the next day, excess can be frozen.
  5. Set your filling aside and turn back to the melon rings. Pat them dry with paper towel. Add them back to the bowl (it should be dry) and sprinkle in the corn flour, toss to evenly coat each ring in the flour.
  6. Make sure your workstation is clean and that you have a plate big enough to hold all the stuffed melon rings, lightly dust cornflour over the whole surface.
  7. Using your hands to stuff the melons, hold a ring of melon in one hand and using the other gather up around a large teaspoon of the filling and press it into the ring. Make sure to press firmly so the stuffing is compacted and not loose.
  8. Placed stuffed pieces on the floured plate, repeat until all the melon is stuffed or you run out of filling.
  9. Heat up a large pan on medium heat, add enough oil to cover the bottom of the pan. To test if the pan is hot enough use the end of a wooden spoon or chopstick, hold it in the oil, if bubbles appear from it then the pan is ready to go.
  10. Carefully place the rings in the pan, be sure not to let them overlap and over-crowd your pan.
  11. Leave the rings to brown on one side, flip and brown the other side (you can use tongs to carefully lift the first ring you placed to see if it is ready to flip, if you stuffed them properly the filling shouldn’t collapse). Transfer them to a tray lined with paper towel, if you have a lot of batches to do then pop them in the oven on a low heat (above 60oc).
  12. Once all the rings are fried off add in your mushroom sauce mix (sans cornflour) and allow it to come to a simmer stirring occasionally.
  13. Taste the sauce and adjust to suit your tastes (remember add a little at a time!).
  14. Once you’re happy with the flavour add in your cornflour/water mix and stir until fully combined and the sauce finishes thickening (it should not be very thick, enough to linger on the back of a spoon).
  15. Add in your melon slices and shake the pan to settle them into the sauce. (before you do this check if you have enough sauce to cover most of the melon if you don’t you may need to add some water).
  16. Simmer for 5 minutes or until the melon is fork-tender, be sure to shake the pan occasionally to prevent sticking at the bottom of the pan.
  17. Serve with rice and whatever accompaniments you like!

Notes:

  1. If your tofu comes in a packet with water it may need to be pressed beforehand to remove excess moisture. Set your tofu block out on a flat surface with a sheet of paper towel underneath, something like a chopping board works. Make sure you put it somewhere excess water can drain off (I put my boards on a kitchen tea towel if the sink drying rack isn’t available). Put another flat surface on top, another chopping board, a clean oven tray, whatever you have. Add some extra weight with a few tins evenly spaced on top and leave it for a few hours.
  2. Wrap your bunch of chives firmly in a sheet of paper towel like a sausage roll. This keeps them together and makes dicing them far easier! Just remember to pull the paper towel down the bunch before the knife gets too close to it.
  3. I haven’t had a chance to test this recipe since making the adjustments, I’d recommend trying out different formats of the sauce try to balance out the bitterness with some sweetness, salt and fat. If you’re vegan maybe try adding extra sesame oil or another flavourful oil that suits the dish, for non-vegans I’d recommend maybe trying tallow or ghee for a bit of extra fatty flavour. I have also read that lightly blanching the bitter melon helps too.
  4. Alternatives include arrowroot flour (for a more gel-like consistency, potato starch (doesn’t go runny when cooling down like corn flour) or even rice flour (be sure to cook out well).
  5. Feel free to play around with sweet miso paste (make sure to dilute it in a separate bowl before adding it to the rest of the ingredients; add less soy sauce or oyster sauce) or sweet mirin instead. You can also try adding other savoury sauce ingredients like fermented black bean, dried scallops or XO sauce.

Stuffed Artichokes

Ingredients

  • 5 Large Artichokes (see note 1)
  • The juice of half a lemon added into a large bowl of water (you may need multiple bowls to hold all the artichokes fully submerged).
  • Olive oil
  • Salt

Stuffing

  • 500g Breadcrumbs (not super fine)
  • 400g finely grated Pecorino Romano cheese (see note 2)
  • 1 large clove of garlic, (the garlic is not intended to be noticeable)
  • Small bunch of parsley, finely chopped, stems included!
  • 1 teaspoon of salt
  • Up to 16 XL eggs (see note 3)

Method

  1. Add the breadcrumbs, cheese, salt, parsley and garlic to a large mixing bowl (the ingredients should only take up half the volume). Mix until combined.
  2. Wash the artichokes and cut off the first inch of the top, discard the top leaves and cut the stem away from the flower, set aside. Put the flower topside down in the lemon water. Repeat with the rest of the artichokes.
  3. Use a small knife to peel away the surface of the stems. Cut in half and add to the water with the flower. Repeat.
  4. Using your thumbs gently pry apart the leaves of the flower starting from the outside and working into the middle. You want to open it up for the stuffing but be sure not to break the leaves. Don’t bother separating the inner leaves, these are the overlapped pale yellow/purple centre leaves.
  5. Put them back into the water while you repeat this step with the other flowers.
  6. Drain the water, shake out any excess water in the artichokes, and leave them upside down in a colander or in the bowl they were just in to drain. Prepare a clean tray or plate for the artichokes to rest on while stuffed.
  7. Prep your pot/s for cooking, you may need to use multiple pots, they must have lids! Check that you can pack the artichokes in tightly so they don’t collapse while cooking, each artichoke will be quite a bit wider when stuffed.
  8. Add the salt and an inch of water, swirl to dissolve the salt.
  9. Prepare the eggs, be sure to check they’re all fresh by doing the float test (see note 3). Crack a dozen of the eggs into the bowl with the stuffing, do this one at a time in a separate bowl before adding them to the stuffing bowl.
  10. If you have someone else around to help you then you can start to mix the stuffing with your hands (it’s easier than a spoon and needed to monitor the texture, wear a pair of gloves). If you don’t pre-crack the rest of the eggs into separate dishes to prevent cross contamination while you mix the stuffing.
  11. Once the eggs are mostly combined check the consistency of the stuffing. We are looking for a slightly sticky dough-like texture. If you’re not there yet keep adding eggs one at a time and mixing until you reach this type of consistency. Any leftover cracked eggs can be kept in the fridge in an airtight jar for 2 days.  
  12. Grab an artichoke and begin to stuff the outside leaves, working in a spiral motion towards the centre of the flower. Use your thumb to make sure the stuffing is right down the bottom of the leaf but don’t worry too much about completely stuffing each space. As you get closer to the middle the leaves will start to compact the filling on the outside, excess filling will fall out, any gaps can be filled in later.
  13. Once you reach the inner leaves stop stuffing and work your way back through the artichoke making sure that there are no gaps left in the centre leaves. Set aside on the prepared tray/plate. Repeat this process with the rest of the artichokes.
  14. If there’s leftover stuffing you can pop a thin layer on top of the artichokes (like a lil hat of stuffing) or freeze it for another time.
  15. Add the artichokes to the pot/s, you will likely need to firmly squish them in there. Add in the stems wherever you can, chop them into smaller pieces if you need to.
  16. Add olive oil through a gap in the artichokes, let it settle for a bit. Add more if you can still see patches of water.
  17. Put lids on and set the stove to medium-high. Once the water begins to boil turn the heat down to a high simmer, set a timer for 30 minutes.
  18. After 30 minutes check on the water levels, there should still be water at the bottom of the pot, you shouldn’t hear the sizzle of the oil frying just yet. If there is not much water left carefully add some in. Put the lid back on and set the timer for another 10 minutes.
  19. After 10 minutes check the internal temperature with a thermometer (kitchen essential especially if you cook with any meat!) it should be above 65oc. If it isn’t at temp yet add a bit more water and cook for another 10 minutes.
  20. If the internal temp is above 65oc, tilt the lid on the pot, increase the temp back to medium-high and allow the water to evaporate fully and for the bottom to start frying. Allow to fry for 5 minutes, monitor for browning or burning at the bottom.
  21. Once browned to your liking turn off the stove and grab a large serving spoon and a pair of tongs. Carefully lift one of the artichokes out of the pot (you might need help keeping the pot steady). The bottom of the artichoke might get left behind but that is ok go back and scrape up the crispy bottom for that artichoke!

Notes

  1. Pick firm artichokes with a bright colour and tightly closed leaves. You don’t want loose or open flowers as the choke has started to set seed and flower head is nearly ready to open. Fresh young artichokes are harder to stuff as the leaves are quite firm.
  2. Pecorino Romano is a hard sheep cheese from Italy similar to Parmigiano Reggiano. You can buy Australian Pecorino Romano but that generally isn’t made with sheep’s milk, but it is cheaper than the imported stuff. You can use any similar cheese you’d like, just be sure to grate it fresh (bagged stuff has a coating to prevent it sticking together and I am unsure if it will effect the consistency) and taste it before adding it in, that way you can measure the amount of salt you need to add to the stuffing. Sometimes I have not needed to add any salt because the cheese was salty enough!
  3. This is the number of eggs I typically use for this many artichokes to make sure the stuffing is light and fluffy. You can use less eggs, the original recipe had very few eggs, which results in a firmer, denser stuffing. I’ve never tried using egg alternatives though I imagine that the right amount of oil, water and baking powder might give a similar texture, the flavour would definitely be different.  Give it a try and let me know how it goes!
  4. You can freeze whole cooked artichokes, be sure to keep them separate and I recommend defrosting slightly in the microwave for 10-15 minutes on the defrost setting before cooking the same way as a raw artichoke with a little less water. 

How to Eat:

Serve hot in a shallow bowl, either with one artichoke per person or as a sharing meal. Be sure to have a bowl for scraps on the table, a fork and some napkins for your hands and mouth (it gets messy).

Use the fork to separate the outer leaves and stuffing from the core, pick off the stuffing from each leaf and eat that before scraping the meaty bottom of the leaves with your teeth, some of the older leaves you can flip and scrape the topside of the leaf. Discard any tough parts.

For the stems, pull apart the inner core of the artichoke and enjoy, the outer part of the stem can be chewed up for their savoury sweet flavour, spit out the tougher fibres.

When you reach the inner part of the artichoke you’ll notice there’s no more leaves just a shallow cone of little fibres, this is the choke. The fibres are attached to the undeveloped seeds (if you’re game you can try to scrape the seeds off the pointy fibres with your teeth) and can be pulled off in one piece to reveal the most valued part of the flower, the heart! This can be eaten whole and is the best way to sample pure artichoke flavour.