What's a man to do when presented with this much green? The answer: braise the hell out of it. For a man as busy as the Peahen (think: eBay auctions; writing Missed Connections for myself; shooting spitballs onto 6th St; etc.), it's an easy hour that solves a lot of problems:
- it can be eaten all week (best on top of quinoa, barley, rice, etc.)
- it takes care of a lot of produce in one fell swoop
- it takes stuff that is on hand (or should be, unless I've fallen down on the job)
- it's amazingly easy
TIME: 45 minutes - 1 hour, largely unattended
- Olive oil
- 1/4 lb good bacon
- 1 onion, diced
- salt
- pepper
- 2 tbsp herbs (I used the fresh basil and some dried rosemary, but you can experiment here)
- 2 tsp chili (powder or whole)
- 2 cups liquid (stock, white wine, red wine, beer...or just plain water)
- mess of vegetables (greens, root, whatever--just chop up anything non-leafy into 2-inch chunks)
Start with olive oil, one big yellow onion and a quarter pound of bacon. Put it in a dutch oven or big pot with a lid. Heat the oil and drop in the onion and bacon. When the onion turns color, add chili (either powdered or whole), herbs, salt and pepper. Lower the heat a touch and cook 'til the bacon gets crispy and pull out the whole mess with a slotted spoon. Leave as much oil and rendered fat as possible in the pot.
Next, turn the heat back up (medium-hot) and dump in all the greens. Cook, stirring frequently, until they begin to caramelize (a.k.a. brown) a bit, maybe 5 minutes or so.
Dump in the onion/bacon/herb mixture. Add the liquid (I used a big, flat beer that I'd been saving for an occasion such as this). Once there's a boil going, turn down the heat to "simmer" or "low," whatever heat is low enough to keep a bit of bubbling going on.
Put the lid back on. Let it cook for 20-30 minutes, until everything reaches the tenderness you want.
Serve over grain, as it will be saucy. Refrigerate the rest.
BOOM. Peahen out.
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