Me: Thanks. It was easy to make yesterday before I went to work, and quick to reheat last night and again tonight. Now that you've eaten it, do you want to know the secret ingredient? Or would you prefer to stay in the dark?
Tony: Let me try to guess. Of course it had eggs. I also tasted corn, zucchini, greens, onion, and cheddar cheese. Was it a spice?
Me: Not exactly. Those greens you ate came from outside. They're dandelions.
Tony: Ummmm.....
Me: Don't worry. It's all good. Yesterday morning I was weeding and trying to figure out what to make for dinner. Something clicked when I saw three monster dandelions growing in the ground cover outside the back garage door. I know you can cook dandelion greens just like any other green. We've had kale, chard, collard, turnip, and mustard, so what's one more type? Besides, I once made myself a salad of dandelion greens and lived to tell. Just to be sure I did a Google search, which led me to an article in the Huffington Post that talked about people actually getting dandelion greens in their CSA baskets.
There was no way I could get a shovel in there to dig out the whole plant so I did the next best thing and pulled off individual leaves. Some of them were a foot long! When I was done I had a couple of cups. Not enough for a side dish of greens, so I had to think (even more) creatively. The Huffington Post article said:
"Because the greens are bitter, they pair perfectly with rich flavors: think goat cheese, egg yolk, bacon, potatoes."We didn't have any bacon or potatoes in the house, but there are always eggs, and we had lots of cheese in the freezer. A fritatta sounded perfect. I washed the dandelion leaves twice, then dried them, chopped them, and dumped them into a baking dish along with one ear of corn, most of the zucchini in the vegetable drawer, a half of onion, and a clove of garlic. Mixed everything together, baked it, then when the vegetables were done added the beaten eggs and cheese and baked again until the top was nice and brown. That's it.
Tony: (Still not looking completely convinced) Well, it did taste good. Did you write a blog post about it?
Me: Great idea!
Five years ago today: New Thing #203--Pay Attention
haha...the salad mix I buy at the grocery has dandelion greens in it! They're tasty!
ReplyDeleteNO KIDDING?!?
DeleteGlad it was a successful dish, I tried dandelion once, I bought it from the store, but did find it bitter. Interesting about pairing it with rich flavours.
ReplyDeleteCooking the greens and adding other ingredients really made a difference.
DeleteMy dad used to make dandelion wine when I was a kid, but we never ate them.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm glad you did write a post about it. I remember there being a HUGE expanse of dandelions next to a river near us in Illinois. People would be out there picking the leaves and I just couldn't imagine eating them. Now... well... perhaps I'll try some day.
ReplyDeleteWe haven't fertilized our lawn in a couple of years, so I wasn't concerned about chemical residue. On public land, though, I might think twice
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