Merely take into consideration, for a minute, what it ought to actually really feel choose to be a broccoli stem. You spend your whole existence struggling to crown your self in flowers, solely to have the crown flip into the one object of appreciation, taking all the glory for itself. Your beautiful florets are stolen from you, destined to show into part of some exalted culinary creation, and likewise you, sad stalk, are tossed inside the trash. It hurts. Precise unhealthy. Deep, deep down.
However it certainly doesn’t have to be meaning, nor should it. Broccoli stems deserve some consideration of their very personal, which signifies that whenever you’re a sort of people inside the habits of throwing them away, you might must rethink that.
There’s fairly a bit you’ll be able to do with broccoli stalks. It helps to consider them like kohlrabi, which is nothing if not an enormous, bulbous stem of broccoli. Kohlrabi is nice every raw and cooked, with a lightweight style and a crisp, juicy coronary heart—and the an identical goes for broccoli stems.
Extreme Eats / Vicky Wasik
You could want to start by determining merely how sturdy their exteriors are, peeling them off within the occasion that they’ve grown too wooden with time. After that, you probably can resolve what to do with them. Once you’ve received adequate, you probably can scale back them into batons or slices and sauté them in a scorching pan with smoking oil, driving adequate heat into their surfaces to get some browned spots.
You may also pickle them in a brine, similar to the one I exploit on this quick-pickled asparagus recipe. It will work merely as properly with broccoli stems. (And, in any case, you probably can play with the flavorings, using fully completely different herbs or omitting them, et cetera.)
Extreme Eats / Vicky Wasik
In all honesty, though, I rarely make such a fuss. Most of the time, I wish to eat the broccoli stems raw, each tossed proper right into a salad or organized on a plate and drizzled with some olive oil and a sprinkling of flaky sea salt. They don’t want quite a bit else. It makes for a gratifying little predinner snack for the cook dinner dinner—solely a take care of, nothing that may smash your urge for meals.
Extreme Eats / Vicky Wasik
And, whenever you happen to be making a platter of crudités, I implore you to include broccoli stems among the many many vegetable alternative. Frankly, they’re far superior to those horrible raw florets, which get an extreme quantity of of the glory because it’s—let’s not heap on way more that they don’t deserve.