Friday, April 4, 2008
The other day I went to Monterey Market with a friend. It's a produce market in North West Berkeley that has amazing produce at amazing prices. One of the specials was a large bag of baby artichokes for $.98. I love artichokes more than is rational, so I grabbed a bag.
The plan was to experiment with cooking them the Jacques Pepin/Lidia Bastianich way, which is to cut away all that is not edible and braising or sauteing. Theoretically, once you've cut it all away, you're left with these cups with stems, which you slice.
Needless to say, Jacques's knife skills are superhuman, and my misshapen little lumps would make the poor Frenchman cry. Still, I thought, I'm going to fucking braise artichokes!
hmpf. I did so in olive oil with onion and garlic, following Lidia's recipe.
They were ok. Yes, only ok. I was really looking forward to all the wonders of the artichoke-y flavor, but actually, the flavor was not very present, and I think I'm deciding that I don't like garlic with my artichokes......
Boo....
