Thursday, April 17, 2008

eat your veggies

according to this month's food and wine, vegetables are all the rage in spain. they are spotlighted as main dishes and proteins take the role of garnish. a wonderful quote from a chef: "diners tend to idealize luxury proteins, but in our globalized world, those have become nothing more than empty status symbols." i wish this guy would talk to my husband.
the general idea is, meats are shipped from all over the place, while local vegetables retain their "personality" and connection to the region. easy enough concept, something we've heard about, but what these chefs are doing with vegetables is amazing. they are dressing vegetables as we've never seen them before. example: chef and his pharmacist sister create boiled potato coated in thin shell of kaolin and lactose. they are served with garlic aioli for dipping.
it's great to see veggies getting some attention. will i be able to convince brian to have a cauliflower steak instead of a beef one? not in the foreseeable future.

my great vegetable discovery of the month is purple carrots. they taste good (kind of sweet), look pretty in salads, prompt people to ask questions (may not be a positive aspect). and because of them, i found this fantastic website: http://carrotmuseum.co.uk/. i was unaware carrots were so inspiring.
even my pugs, crosley and francie, enjoy them. take that with a grain of salt, however, as they have also been known to peruse the cat box for a snack.

4 comments:

valereee said...

Those purple carrots? Do not use them in cooking. Trust me on this. I put them in chicken noodle soup a few weeks back. My son took one look and said, "What's wrong with this soup?" I told him to close his eyes and eat.

k said...

good tip. i noticed they tinged my fingers purple when i was peeling. i can only imagine what they did to soup.

maybelles mom said...

I love those carrots. I added them to chicken soup, but steamed them separately and then popped them in at the very last minute. I use them shredded and raw but again at the last minute.

valereee said...

Oh, good idea! I'll have to try steaming them next time.