I've told you before that we often make Crescent Dragonwagon's gumbo when we have an abundance of CSA leafy greens, and I've also told you before that it's A Project. So delicious, such a pain. This weekend I used one of its elements in a much more streamlined way.
We were behind on eating CSA greens. It's a total first-world problem to struggle with eating all of our beautiful organic leafy greens -- and yet it's a struggle to eat all of our beautiful organic leafy greens. When I stuffed them into my giant Instant Pot, it was three-quarters full. I poured in a 46-ounce bottle of V-8 and maybe another pint of water. I cooked them under pressure for 12 minutes, because it's easier to get kids (and grownups!) to eat leafy greens if they are thoroughly cooked, and also because you can take the girl out of the South but you can't take the South out of the girl, and I still prefer my greens cooked to tenderness. I let the pressure come down naturally.
I want to stress here that I did pretty much zero prep. I soaked them briefly in cold water because greens do tend to have some dirt hiding in their crevices, but I didn't fuss about removing ribs or stems or chopping or whatever else. I just chucked them in the pot, doused them in liquid, and pressure-cooked them into submission. I got out my immersion blender and briskly turned them into puree.
I also cooked a pound of white beans, adding about 2t. salt once they were soft. At dinnertime I cooked up a package of sweet Italian sausage. I added a head of garlic, slivered, to the cooking fat, and deglazed the pan with about a cup of white wine once I took the cooked sausage out and chopped it up. I found that I wanted to make one flavor adjustment late in the cooking process: the V-8 made the greens puree fairly acidic, so I added a wee little sprinkle (maybe an eighth of a teaspoon) of baking soda to raise the pH. Once the fizzing was over, the flavor balance was better. I combined it all and served it up with some good bread and a plate of raw veggies for crunch.
Honestly, I was not expecting this to be a super-popular dinner, but everybody enthused about it. The greens are pleasingly vegetal but unobtrusive, the beans are mild and tender, and the sausage and garlic offer little bursts of flavor. It's like gumbo's more easygoing cousin.
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