I’m in a food rut. Lucky for me, it’s early spring and there are a host of vegetables I don’t often cook. Fiddlehead ferns, for one. They’re the windy green stalks of a fern that haven’t yet grown. They’re high in iron, fibre and deliciousness as long as you’re not afraid of them. Mom says to steam them first, for a few minutes to soften them. I don’t have a double boiler so instead I just stick a strainer on top of a pot of boiling water, works just fine. I steamed them about five minutes. They got a little brown in color.
Then, I added 2 cloves of minced garlic, salt, pepper and olive oil to a pan, and turned the heat on high, and sautéed them, adding about 1/4 a cup of chicken broth to soften further and add flavor. You can eat them alone, but I served them with patty-pan squash, which has a sweeter taste, to offset the bitter, earthiness of the ferns. I cooked the squash in the same mixture, just tossed them in first and then let the ferns cook. The squash took about 15 minutes, the ferns 10. They were still crunchy, which is how I like them.
I served the vegetables with Israeli couscous and broiled sea bass. The whole meal took 35 minutes to cook.
Mom, How do I make this? 