Learning to Love Greens

It's spring and many gardeners are planting greens, but for some, they can be a little unpalatable. Thankfully this problem is easily solved.

I love greens - but I know that many people do not feel the same way. Sometimes gardeners grow them because they like them - but are frustrated that their family will not eat them. Sometimes gardeners grow them because they know they are healthy - but then find that even THEY don’t like them. This is problematic enough when hard-earned money has been spent to buy them, but for some reason, it’s even harder when time and effort has been spent on growing them.

All greens are delicious when they are prepared the right way and with a little imagination. [source: https://pixabay.com/photos/spinach-vegetables-food-cook-green-6675199/]

I think a key problem is that - at least for many North Americans - greens are never the star of the show. The protein is the lead singer; the starch is lead guitar, bass, keyboard and drums, and the greens are the guy playing the triangle.

Many times I’ve been at restaurants, even fine-dining restaurants, and found the “veg” portion to be very average, or below average. What’s more - they tend to all be cooked together - as though beans, carrots, corn and Brussels Sprouts all have the exact same cooking requirements (e.g. over-cook or under-cook, then smother with butter). What’s more - I think most people don’t even eat them anyway, which is probably why restaurants don’t put in much effort in their preparation, or even bother to buy them fresh.

Denature, flavor, and season

One popular way to prepare greens (as alluded to above) is to simply remove all the “green” flavor, by boiling and/or over-cooking (denature), then adding butter (flavor), and then adding salt and pepper (season) to taste. This is an effective way to get people to eat greens - but it is not a good way to get people to like them, because the only flavor that is really being offered is the butter and seasoning. All this really does is reinforce a love of butter.