What's your favorite less-ordinary vegetable, and how do you like to cook it?

Pickled beets! I prefer to peel and slice the beets while raw. I want a pot of water coming up to boil while I do the manual labor for optimal timing.

Cooking time can vary but longer is typically better in my experience. 35-45 minutes is typical depending on the thickness you went with. I always set the timer for 35 minutes to come back to check for tenderness before I start measuring out and heating the brine.

For the brine I suggest starting out with 2c water, 2c sugar, 2c vinegar and then adjusting to taste. I usually do 4lbs of beets and that amount of brine is sufficient. Once the sugar is dissolved I bring it to a boil before turning the heat all the way down and adding in the spices to let it steep for 10 minutes or however long the beets take to finish getting tender. I use ground cinnamon, whole or ground cloves, and whole or ground allspice berries. I've never measured but maybe 1 tsp of ground cinnamon and ground allspice, and 1/4 tsp of ground clove. If using whole allspice I'd say maybe 10-20 berries and 10 whole cloves.

Once the beets are tender to your liking, strain the boiled beets, cover them with the brine, and put it in the fridge where the flavor will mature after around 48 hours.
 
I’m central american so this is how we eat them there but my choices for less ordinary veggies are radishes, watercress and guisquil. For the radishes, we make a cold salad with tomatoes, mint, limr and beef and eat it in a tortilla. Super fresh. The watercress we wash and coat in egg then fry it and serve with tomato sauce. You can do the same either way guisquil and also stuff it with cheese. It’s also super good in soups.
 
PunkN said:
I’m from the southeast U.S. We eat a lot of greens (collards, turnips) and black eyed peas. Also okra is yummy. We also like bok choy.
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And we L O V E our Hoppin John on NYD. That's what 10yrs living below the Manson Nixon line will do to ya.
 
That's it. Mason Dixon line. It's an old joke. I am an old person.
 
Here you go.

Google:

Just as the original Mason-Dixon line was associated with a divided nation (North vs. South, slave vs. free), the Manson-Nixon line was used to evoke a sense of a country breaking down or divided between extremes in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Me: it is an invocation of the turbulence of the times. Using references to Charles Manson and Richard Nixon (who commented publicly on the Manson Murder trials while they were underway which was regarded - rightly - as interfering with the justice system).
 
HereKittyKitty said:
Here you go.

Google:

Just as the original Mason-Dixon line was associated with a divided nation (North vs. South, slave vs. free), the Manson-Nixon line was used to evoke a sense of a country breaking down or divided between extremes in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Me: it is an invocation of the turbulence of the times. Using references to Charles Manson and Richard Nixon (who commented publicly on the Manson Murder trials while they were underway which was regarded - rightly - as interfering with the justice system).
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I figured it was something to do with Richard and Charlie
 
WLBLD said:
Love Japanese eggplant. You can steam & then pour spicy or other sauce over after 🙂
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That sounds delicious and much healthier than what I do. I usually slice, pan fry with oil, and then finish with some soy sauce and fresh ginger in the pan. The eggplant becomes soft and buttery not like regular eggplant. And the skin is so tender you don’t choke on it.
 
PunkN said:
I’m from the southeast U.S. We eat a lot of greens (collards, turnips) and black eyed peas. Also okra is yummy. We also like bok choy.
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Love the greens. Don't really know how it's cooked. That's what I have a wife for.
 
CNCCurrency said:
Dose it have licorice taste? Never tried fennel sausage
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Not really. And it’s not an overpowering taste. I probably should have said Italian sausage, because most store bought sweet Italian sausage has fennel. Some has whole fennel and some has ground. Lots of people don’t like whole fennel seeds.
 
Grogu said:
That sounds delicious and much healthier than what I do. I usually slice, pan fry with oil, and then finish with some soy sauce and fresh ginger in the pan. The eggplant becomes soft and buttery not like regular eggplant. And the skin is so tender you don’t choke on it.
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You can also airfry them too. Ive done both ways. They do absorb a lot of oil frying
 
Snap peas. Toss 'em in the pan with the salmon covered in a skillet, drizzle them with the same honey-soy-ginger glaze during the last 7-8min.

Brussels Sprouts. Feel like I'm a giant as I stuff an entire whole cabbage into my mouth! Cook the same way as the peas.

Southern cooks where I work, I love the fried okra they make! Collard greens with chunks of bacon too.

Edit due to Samsquanch reminding me: Really like asparagus, especially with "Holiday Sauce". (what my kids called Hollandaise when they were young).
 
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randompersonrandom said:
We know potatoes are good, and so are onions, corn, and tomatoes. But there are a billion other kinds of vegetables that aren't in every shopping cart. Share which ones you found out at some point are good enough to have at home!

Mine's a three-way tie:

Turnips and radishes, roasted. Both of them have a total change in their flavor when cubed to about half an inch, oiled (I use a spray bottle with avocado oil to get full coverage without adding too much oil) salted, seasoned (I like to hit them with herbes de provence and garlic, but any root vegetable is good with any seasoning), and roast in the convection oven at around 450, stirring them around the sheet pan after 30 minutes until they turn brown and crispy on the corners. Radishes are like "potatoes but less potatoey" (and both the red small ones and the daikon are excellent, but I like daikon because it's less of a hassle to cube) and turnips have their own flavor that's a little sharp like all the non-potato root vegetables (think carrots and parsnips, but less sweet.)

Amaranth leaves. If you're in Texas, you may have wild amaranth growing as a weed near you; they call it "pigweed" down here and it's invasive. Don't forage it by the levee in dfw, it's not safe because there's too much lead in the soil. But you can grow it yourself, just spread it when it gets reasonably warm, water it til it's established, and then mostly ignore it. It gets huge and the leaves are delicious when cooked like collard greens. I love them in soup; they add better body than spinach and are milder in flavor than mustard greens. If I stew them in a crockpot with stock, a ham bone and some turkey sausage, any chopped summer squash, and seasoning, then add some tortellini or gniocchi or chickpeas, quinoa, rice whatever, it's wonderful. Red, green and bronze is all very good, and the bugs don't usually get them too badly. I get the seeds for the wild stuff and grow from that, too, because I sure do love that variety even if I
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anhydrous said:
Pickled beets! I prefer to peel and slice the beets while raw. I want a pot of water coming up to boil while I do the manual labor for optimal timing.

Cooking time can vary but longer is typically better in my experience. 35-45 minutes is typical depending on the thickness you went with. I always set the timer for 35 minutes to come back to check for tenderness before I start measuring out and heating the brine.

For the brine I suggest starting out with 2c water, 2c sugar, 2c vinegar and then adjusting to taste. I usually do 4lbs of beets and that amount of brine is sufficient. Once the sugar is dissolved I bring it to a boil before turning the heat all the way down and adding in the spices to let it steep for 10 minutes or however long the beets take to finish getting tender. I use ground cinnamon, whole or ground cloves, and whole or ground allspice berries. I've never measured but maybe 1 tsp of ground cinnamon and ground allspice, and 1/4 tsp of ground clove. If using whole allspice I'd say maybe 10-20 berries and 10 whole cloves.

Once the beets are tender to your liking, strain the boiled beets, cover them with the brine, and put it in the fridge where the flavor will mature after around 48 hours.
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Vegetable slaw made with green & red cabbage with broccoli and carrots. I then add red wine vinegar, salt, and pepper. It’s my go to fiber and I truly enjoy it as a snack or a side dish.
 
Dos-Dox said:
I had no idea this stuff was worth eating! Very interesting.

It’s not super interesting, but I’ll say I like rutabaga. We use it as a potato substitute in a lot of recipes when we want to reduce the number of carbs we’re consuming. They’re less bitter than turnips and they last a LONG time on the counter before you cook them, so they’re handing to have around.
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my mother made rutabagas every thanksgiving!
 
I love artichokes, cooked in a pot with about an inch of water, garlic, herbs, lemon in the water
Then eat plain or with a dip; healthy is vegan mayo or silk tofu with dijon mustard, classic is mayo with dijon. They are high in prebiotic fiber.
Bok Choy, especially baby bok choy, delicious just lightly boiled or steamed.
okinawan sweet potatoes, sweet though low in sugar high in fiber and bright purple!
boiled, baked, or steamed.
 
Sasquatch said:
2 pages and no Asparagus?
It's comin' up soon! Like candy coming out of the ground! 😍
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There's a family down here that I celebrate Easter, Christmas, Thanksgiving, and 4th of July with. The wife ALWAYS makes asparagus. I forget asparagus even exists til I go spend a holiday with them, and I eat the HELL out of it.
 
mine is chuchu (chayote), saw it mentioned here already and got excited because nobody outside Brazil seems to know it.

The way we eat it in Brazil is super simple: boil it, season with olive oil, garlic and salt. That's it. Very mild, very light, goes with rice and beans or anything really.

Low cal, cheap, easy to digest. Not fancy at all but gets the job done.
 
randompersonrandom said:
There's a family down here that I celebrate Easter, Christmas, Thanksgiving, and 4th of July with. The wife ALWAYS makes asparagus. I forget asparagus even exists til I go spend a holiday with them, and I eat the HELL out of it.
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Love that stuff. We bought some at Aldi last week, looked thin, but fresh. I did it last night on the outside griddle with butter, salt, pepper and garlic powder. Stuff was tender and really good.
 
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