My favorite ways to cook vegetables are miles away from one another. The first involves the very gentlest of cooking – so much so that you’re not even doing it over the stove – the second, roasting the holy hell out of them. In either case, this is a way to make vegetables that are robust enough to complete the meal when paired with a nice piece of meat, chicken or fish.
Technique 1: the teakettle technique
If you have an electric kettle, you’ll love this approach (if not, just use your stovetop kettle). Fill it up full with water and bring it to a boil; meanwhile, trim your veggies, and rinse them in a metal colander. When the kettle’s on the boil, set the metal colander in the sink and slowly and carefully pour the boiling water over your veggies. When you’re out of boiling water, the veggies are done. Blast them with cold water from the faucet for about a minute to stop the cooking. You’re done.
This is a green bean’s heaven. Green beans cooked this way are tender and perfect; toss them with olive oil and salt, or a vinaigrette, or some plain old melted butter. Snow peas also are amazing cooked like this, and respond well to a bit of sesame oil for seasoning. Broccoli can be tossed with olive oil and lemon juice and served as a side – or any of these can be mixed into salad greens.
Technique 2: the holy-hell roast
Big roasting pan, a few big glugs of oil (olive or canola) and some high heat – around 450 degrees. The only variable is how long it will take for the vegetable in question to achieve the critical brown caramelized quality that makes this so tasty. Brussels sprouts, halved lengthwise with a few cloves of chopped garlic, were made for this technique (don’t even consider boiling a Brussels sprout, no matter what your mother says) and will take about 20 minutes. Broccoli, amazingly, also takes this method well, but will only take about 8 minutes. Hard root vegetables like carrots and parsnips will be around 25 minutes.
Eat your veggies!