Thursday, November 19, 2009

Barely Cooked Chard with Lemon and Parmesan

This year my CSA has loaded up my box with greens. Few can match me in my love for spinach, chard, kale, and collards, so it means something that I had so much of them that eating them was a burden. I've picked up some new tricks for greens, now. This was one of my favorites. Its basic outline--greens with olive oil and lemon juice--is unremarkable, but as always, adding a ton of Parmesan cheese makes it great. This also straddles the line nicely between cooked and raw. It's more substantial than a salad, but it's still as refreshing as one. It serves two and is really quick.

  • 5 large chard leaves
  • 1 or 2 large cloves garlic, julienned
  • 2 tbs. pine nuts (optional)
  • juice of 1/2 lemon
  • Parmesan cheese
  • olive oil, salt, pepper

Cut out the stems from the chard and cut them into inch-long pieces. Start this cooking in a bit of olive oil (use as little as possible--you'll be adding more) in a big pan over medium heat. Add the garlic, pine nuts, and a bit of salt, and give this a stir from time to time as you prepare the rest of the dish.

In a jar (or a bowl), combine the lemon juice with equally much olive oil. Grind in some pepper and add in lots of Parmesan cheese. Shake this up.

Cut up the chard and add it to the pan, along with some salt (greens need a lot of salt!). Stir for about thirty seconds. The goal is to stop cooking the chard at the first sign of wilting; remember that it will keep on cooking after you remove it, so err on the side of taking it out too soon. Remove everything into a large bowl, pour the dressing over, and toss.

4 comments:

lindsay said...

Yeah, this is really good. But I like the peanut-buttery collards even more!

Toby said...

I want to make the peanut-buttery collards one more time to get the recipe right, since it was so much better the first time around (not that the second time was bad).

Toby said...

I forgot to mention the orange variation that we made! Change the lemon juice to orange juice with a little bit of rice or white wine vinegar mixed in. We did it with Parmesan, but I didn't think it went as well with the orange juice as it did with the lemon juice. Maybe cut it, and add some nutmeg? Maybe change the olive oil to butter?

lindsay said...

Mmm, butter.