Iron Chef?

Wednesday night is family dinner night – we call it Wednesday Winers. We mostly drink wine, but to maintain a level of respectability we eat dinner also, taking turns preparing the meal (or taking turns ordering take-out). Tonight is my turn to cook. Boy is my family in for a real treat. (You may read that last sentence with heavy sarcasm if you wish.)

I may have mentioned in past blogs that my day job includes, among other things, overseeing an urban farm. One of the perks of the job is I get to sample the veggies. Yesterday’s harvest included mixed salad greens, spinach, broccoli, turnips, turnip greens and kohlrabi. At eight o’clock last night my kitchen (having just been thoroughly cleaned in anticipation of Daughter #1’s arrival from the BIG CITY) was turned into a one-woman version of television’s Iron Chef. Without benefit of recipes or a trip to the grocery store for special ingredients I undertook the challenge of preparing Wednesday night’s meal for my family. This is what I created:

A beautiful salad of mixed greens – since this mix contains about 742 varieties of lettuces and greens I won’t add anything to it except a vinaigrette dressing when served. The fresh spinach I added to a whole wheat pasta, mushroom and pesto dish. I will cheat and add some freshly grated Parmesan cheese I know is in my grandmother’s refrigerator (or icebox as she still calls it). I’ll steam the broccoli and top with a lemon-garlic-butter before we sit down to eat.

Now for the Bobby Flay Throwdown challenge: what to do with the turnips, greens and kohlrabi? I chopped the turnip greens and sautéed them in olive oil with garlic. What began as a bowl of greens roughly the size of a washing machine cooked down to about two cups. This is what is referred to in the south as “a mess of greens.” Digging through my pantry in search of ingredients I found a box of quinoa, a wonderfully versatile grain, which I cooked and mixed with the greens. I diced the turnips, boiled them until tender with chopped onion and topped the greens with the cooked turnips. After reheating this evening I will add toasted almond slivers to the dish.

Last, but by no means least, the kohlrabi. By the time I got to this vegetable (and after a couple of glasses of wine) it looked like little green aliens had invaded my kitchen. I think kohlrabi was the inspiration for the design of the 1950s Sputnik. Having never cooked or eaten kohlrabi I was stumped. Taking a cue from the turnips I employed the same cooking process. I sautéed the leaves and diced and boiled the bulb – then I threw it all in the food processor and made a kohlrabi puree. I’m not exactly sure how to serve this bright green paste – as a dip, a spread, or just a blob of a side dish? I’m on my way to being crowned the culinary winner of this vegetable challenge – because after a few glasses of wine, no one really cares what we eat!