I'll Be Your Whortleberry

Blueberry is the common name of the fruit picked from vaccinium angustifolium but this is a recent development. For most of the plant’s Post-Columbian history it has been known by alternative names the lowbush, hurtleberry and whortleberry – the latter is similar to the blueberry albeit in the form of a larger, back-hued berry. Occasionally when the blueberry isn’t uniformly blue, it is mistaken for bilberry, bog-bilberry, huckleberry and cranberry.

Whortleberries look like blueberries but they taste different; tannic and decidedly less sweet, so the confusion is understandable. But cranberries, duh, are obviously cranberries, how could they possibly be confused for anything else? Cranberries are also a card carrying member of the vaccinium genus – a name itself that derives from vacca or cow, an animal who loved and possibly still enjoy ruminating themselves silly on berries. Besides being cousins, the blue and cran berry’s wild forms are similar in appearance and both plants thrive in the poor soil of boggy/marshy lands and acidic/humusy soil.

In fact only in the last 100 years of so has the blueberry made out of the pastureland and into the markets. In the 20s, the 1920s, USDA scientist Frederick Coville began working with Whitesbog, New Jersey cranberry grower Elizabeth White; together they studied the growing conditions and selected varietals for breeding. Most commercial blueberries are harvested from tamed wild strands Elizabeth White selected in her research.

The plants aren’t propagated by some combination of seeds, bees and pollen but rather they spread by underground stems. The plants don’t get tall, commercial varieties grow 12 to 18 inches high but the plant cluster can extend outward 40 feet in diameter. Detractors claim the berry available in the grocery doesn’t taste like much and some breeders have crossed the frequently cultivated lowbush plants with wild highbush varieties in order to produce a redolent, pronounced blueberry flavor.

Occasionally blueberries are cited as the healthiest food ever because they are rich, freakishly loaded with the cancer fighting, cholesterol lowering, anti-aging, blood clot inhibiting antioxidants. Be aware, individual foods aren’t good or bad for you, but overall the totality of diets can be healthy or artery stoppers: A pint of berries every week is not going to offset the cigarette smoking, gin drinking, fried food eating and lack of exercise that has been going. On top of having a healthy reputation, blueberries are popular because they freeze well – their thick skins help retain their shape and texture post thawing.

The best way to eat blueberries is fresh and local: They taste better fresh and in season - the quicker the berries move from field to table the better the flavor. That along with the fact local growers can bank up to 70% of yearly profits from berry crops (Support your local farmer). Since fresh is good, the first crops show up in California in early June, the Pacific NW takes its turn in July, berries remain fresh through August in the upper Midwest and that last blueberries get picked in Maine as summer fades into autumn. Not to suggest you follow the season like a Grateful Dead reunion, just laying out the information for you.

Bluebonic Pie

Saucyman – What should I do so the blueberries don’t get all mushy in my pie? – Piholden

There are 3 things you can do to prevent the fresh blueberries from turning into a jelly-like consistency as you bake your pie. First, you need to do is check the recipe you’re using. I know, nothing is more reliable than something randomly found on the internet, but in this instance maybe, possibly you might want work from a book. And not just any book, but a reliable, recently published cookbook. Food styles change constantly, what passed for fine dining in my 1971 edition of the Culinary Arts Institute’s Cookbook – canned blueberries mixed in to a very thick Beurre manié (flour and butter combined as an uncooked roux) then baked - that recipe would never pass muster today. Granted in that era there were ashtrays on the tables of these places but still. Fundamentally the instructions are sound but the recipe would produce a fruit flavored brick that would embarrass a Hostess Fruit Pie with its lack of subtlety.

Not quite as retrograde, the 90’s version of the Joy of Cooking recommends 4 Tablespoons of cornstarch or instant tapioca (per 5 cups of berries). While both substances help thicken liquids, they aren’t interchangeable and 4 Tablespoons of either is a lot. Granted the Joy is a workhorse, the Toyota Camry of Kitchen References – It’s not gonna win a drag race and it's not much of a looker but it is going to work every time you use it. 2 Tablespoons of cornstarch is more than enough and even a little less tapioca will get the job done.

Bake the pie pastry sans filling or blind as the kids say and cook the blueberry filling on the stovetop. Many people claim the assembling of components is somehow not real baking but I never quite understand that argument – If the blueberries cook quicker than the pastry, how are you going to work around that? Divorce the filling from the crust - cook the bottom part of the pastry weighted down with pie weights, roll the top of the pie out into a thin, quick-to-cook veneer. While waiting for the bottom of crust to bake, combine ¼ of the berries, all the sugar and starch in a pan, heat until they come together, remove from heat, fold in the remaining berries. When the shell is starting to brown after 20 minutes, remove the weights – fill with berries, cover with the top pastry and bake for an additional 10-15 minutes.

Mostly, though I wouldn’t cook a traditional pie. I would go with a blueberry tart. Line a tart pan with a pâté sucrée (sweet crust), shortbread or straight up piecrust and bake. Fill the baked tart with a pastry cream, Cream Anglaise, mascarpone, yogurt, lemon curd, sweetened cream cheese – lightened with 1/3 of a cup of chantilly whip cream and top with fresh uncooked blueberries…For what is the point of seasonal fresh fruit if you can’t show it in all its glory?

Bulgar to the Point of Distraction

What do you cook when it gets hot? Scorchin'

Assuming salad, specifically garden salad and green salad, isn’t cooking – I do the same thing everyone else does: grill, eat out, try to make things that take little effort and less heating - Considering eating out to be a luxury this year, I have been having a romance with bulgar this summer.

Not a Bulgar, in the Bulgarian sense, but the whole-wheat cereal. Sometimes bulghur, occasionally burghul, the word comes from the Turkish language meaning roughly ‘bruised grain’. Bulgaria, which borders Turkey’s European toehold in the west, was part of the Ottoman Empire until about 100 years ago. This region has been the breadbasket for the greater Istanbul area going back to the time that it was Constantinople.

Bulgar, the food, is largely considered a natural or whole food but it is actually processed. Not processed in the Twinkie sense; the product is made by steaming, then drying whole-wheat kernels, usually the durum wheat variety. The result of the steaming and subsequent drying leaves a smooth, hardened interior – similar to parboiled rice. After the surrounding bran and the attached germ are removed, the remaining endosperm is processed into coarse pieces. The smaller pieces are reserved for couscous, puddings and combined with ground fava beans to make a kind of falafel.

For the most part it is the bigger chunks, and here big is relative (3.5 mm), that are sold as bulgar. The cracked wheat can be cooked painlessly on any day. Pour boiling liquid over the grains and cover for 10-20 minutes – but especially noticeable on a hot day, the minimal effort it takes to prepare bulgar might actually require fewer calories than calling for a pizza delivery.

Steamed or sautéed veg served over bulgar that has been flavored with chopped mint and basil is pretty much a meal onto itself. Adding steamed fish or either hot or cold chicken –& don’t sell the rotisserie chicken short on a 100-degree day - isn’t really necessary. I rather go with a side of sliced cucumbers tossed in a mixture of garlic, lemon juice and yogurt but some folks really like their protein.

Mark Bittman recommends breakfast bulgar, he also suggests bulgar can be used in a burrito, which I have no objection to really other than I think the concoction would cease to be a burrito the moment that bulgar was added. Chickpeas and grilled lamb are natural partners, as are mushrooms and soy sauce; the latter in more of a side dish type of way. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention tabbouleh/tabouli, whose constituent parts of scallion, tomato, parsley and mint – combined with bulgar make something less good than they do standing alone, so I will be remiss.

Tom Yummy

Lemongrass, what can you tell me about other than it is good? Lemony Snack-it

Lemongrass, or depending on the reference source, lemon grass, is a perennial native to the archipelagoes Malaysia, Sri Lanka and/or Indonesia. Today the herb is cultivated in extensively throughout Asia, particularly the tropical Southeastern part that includes Thailand, Laos, the country we call Cambodia and Vietnam. Lemongrass is now a commercial crop in the US, the Caribbean and parts of South America and Africa. The culinary variety, Cymbopogon citratus, grows to about 2 feet in length but there are over 50 plants in the Cymbopogon genus - some of the family grow as large 3 feet wide and 6 feet high.

Lemongrass is frequently planted on slopes - in part because the plant thrives in soil that is well drained and additionally because the plant can throw some serious roots down it is often planted to help prevent soil erosion. Beyond land management, lemongrass is revered for its medical uses. Also know as fever grass, a tea/infusion is used in treating bouts of malaria in western Africa and Asia. The plant is rich in geraniol, vitamin A, and its essential oil is used in cosmetics like shampoo, perfume and soap. For people who keep a clean house and are looking for something better than a lemon fresh scent – your can now upgrade to a lemongrass clean home - the oils from the plant are commonly used and now marketed in cleaners, antifungal agents and smelly things like potpourri.

I like to think of lemongrass as the antithesis to Midwestern foods – light, fragrant with the promise of citrus, a scent that I find more limey than lemony but I wasn’t on the naming/translating committee, so I need to let it go. While lemongrass is now ubiquitous among food enthusiasts, its near universal embrace is meteoritic: Waverly Root mentions the herb in Food, published first in 1980, “lemon grass [is] used freely in Vietnamese cooking” and that is all. The 1988 edition of On Food and Cooking, bypasses the lemongrass. Correcting this oversight for the 2004 version of his classic volume, Harold McGee gives the perennial its due with a rather thick paragraph about its origin, uses and flavoring compounds.

I first became aware of lemongrass through Thai food – returning from a Cubs game in the late 1980s, my then girlfriend talked me into eating dinner at Thai restaurant by telling me the food was like Chinese food. It was not true, but the lie worked. I still remember my first sip of Tom Yum, less memorably there was the gateway Thai food: Pad Thai. Alan Davidson cites steamed crabs in an earthenware pot with lots of lemon grass as a typical dish. I like pounding the hell out of the bulb end, with chilies, fish sauce, garlic and shallots and grilling paper thin cuts of sirloin – the tops can be used as skewers. You know plus curries, soups and almost anything else it is in.

A Clean, Well-Lighted Place

I have been away from my TV for too long, but McCafe? Please explain? Au Lait

Modeled after a successful experiment at a Melbourne, Australia McDonald’s, McCafés hit the States in 2001 and expanded to 13 different countries by the end of 2003. Although the Illinois based Company hasn’t confirmed sales figures, reporting estimates that McDonald’s with McCafés generated 15% more revenue than the chain’s café-less fast-fooderies. Coincidentally, McCafés will be found in the majority of McDonald’s US outlets by the end of 2009.

Starbucks, a company you’d believe is synonymous with caffeine in the US, is actually third in the coffee sales behind Dunkin' Donuts and McDonald’s. The Seattle based giant will close 800 more outlets this year, but they are responding to the changing market with its own concept: True cafés featuring alcohol, community events and hand-pulled instead of the inferior automated espresso. Rather than carrying the name of the Quaker pilot from Moby Dick, these new non-Starbucks will be named after the neighborhoods they are located in - the concept stores are slated to open in Seattle later this year.

In many ways it is easy to bag on McDonald’s: The food has been accused of blandness and worse fattening (Super Size Me). An economy based McJobs is not really a healthy one, advertising directly to children is not ethical, the company’s supply chain is so expansive that the McNuggets fried at the Mall come from chickens raised on feed grown on land that was formerly Amazon rainforest. While all that is fundamentally true, it is also a little more complex - Not every meal is going to be haute cuisine and fat satisfies, an entry level job is not one you will have for life, no excuses for their under-tween marketing and McDonald’s is one of the world’s largest buyers, for better and worse, with 70 billion dollars in annual sales, the golden arches purchasing power has the ability to alter markets.

In 2004, McDonald’s began offering reusable cups for milk. By 2006 per capita milk consumption had risen for the first time in 20 years – analysts believe this singular event caused the turn around. Corporate specs for beef changed the way cattle chutes were designed quicker than the EPA or the marginal PETA could have enacted more humane standards. Trans-fats are being phased out from McDonald’s – The fast food giant is twice as large as their 4 closest competitors combined, meaning trans-fats will disappear from all fast food menus as demand dries up for the not good fat. The energy used in manufacturing their packaging has been reduced by ½ in the last 20+ years. In the UK, some coffee offered at McDonald's is fair trade. The corporation has the ability to transform the market with their purchasing might and unlike Wal-Mart, McDonald's has a reputation for developing partnerships with their suppliers, rather than beating them up for every last quarter of a cent.

As the US’s coffee habit switches from drip coffee to espresso based drinks, McDonald’s has followed suit. Some will sneer and complain this expansion will drive the small independent shops out of business, I’d counter a dairy-laden, sweetened coffee drink isn’t directly competing with the fair-trade, estate-grown, micro-roasted beans prepared on the archaic brass and copper espresso maker by a dude or chick who builds custom made fixed gears spare time – don’t worry your tastes are still pure and above commercialism.

Try a Little Bitterness

Saucy – Some cookbooks tell me to salt eggplant to help extract bitter compounds, other instructions tell me to just cook the damn thing in an oven, but if I bake it without first salting, wouldn’t cooking just condense the bitter flavors? – Auberjean

Eggplant has a reputation for being bitter that just isn’t true. Maybe its repute stems from the fact is a member of the deadly nightshade family of plants. There is more nicotine in an eggplant than any other fruit/veg but overall, still it isn't like smoking a cigarette. While older aubergines can be more bitter than the younger models, they are nothing compared to bitter eggplants that are grown in Asia (China and India grow nearly to 90% of the world’s eggplants). Produce grown in the US is not prized for its bitterness – shelf-life, holding up to transportation and sweetness are primary considerations for choosing cultivars. Maybe at one point, not even that far in the distant past, 20-30 years ago, salting in order to extract bitter compounds might have been a concern, but in the new millennium this isn’t a factor. Since many of those books are still in print, there is some confusion to why you want to salt an eggplant before cooking.

The eggplant is essentially a land sponge…thousands upon thousands air pockets are interspersed with in the eggplant’s flesh. As the aubergine is cooked for an extended period the air pockets disappear and the water trapped in the plant’s cells evaporate, leaving a smooth, pâté like texture: a great thing for dishes that are prized for their melt in the mouth feel like baba ghanoush, moussaka and/or imam bayildi.

But not so great if you desire a meatier or al dente texture, like if you were grilling or otherwise cooking slices of eggplant over dry heat - you might want to extract moisture before throwing it over the heat - as the liquid from the eggplant vaporizes, you will be left with hallow shell of your former veg. Salting becomes even more important when an eggplant is fried. When frying or deep-frying the moisture from the eggplant will bubble its way to the surface and steam away. The cell walls of the veg, formerly held in place by liquid will absorb oil to replace the newly departed water, producing not only oily food but an expensive product to boot, as the eggplant’s capacity to drink cups of olive oil is astounding.

It is far better to collapse the cell walls by extracting moisture before grilling or frying. This can be done by slicing the eggplant and salting, preferably with Kosher Salt - let the slices sit for about 30 minutes on a cooling rack or colander (so the moisture has someplace to go). When you return to the veg you will notice a brown liquid on the surface of the slices, while not particularly bitter, your aubergine will cook better without it– rinse the salt and liquid off, pat the slices dry with a paper towel.

Gaul'd

Any Bastille Day Plans? Franco-American

On July 14, 1789 hungry, angry Parisians stormed the Bastille - A city fortress used to hold a handful of political prisoners. The Bastille was especially hated, because enemies of the French State & Crown could be held indefinitely - afforded neither due process nor habeas corpus, detained solely on the written word of a noble. (Not to be overlooked, the Bastille was also an armory) – In a tragic footnote almost too unbelievably French to be true - All the causalities in the attack happened after the surrender of the fortress. Much like our Independence Day didn’t instantly create a pluralistic democracy with fewer than 100 signatures, the storming of the Bastille did not begin the epoch of fraternity, liberty and equality. The July uprising that would eventually depose the French Monarchy gave way to the short-lived republic that dissolved into The Reign of Terror, which in turn brought Napoleon to power. Later, the ill-conceived sequels of Napoleon II & III, counter-revolution, Bourbon restoration, the Third Republic, the Vichy Government and a few other detours – It is still, like our own governance, a work in progress.

Still the day is designated as fete, a national holiday/day of celebration in France. In the US, notably New York, Chicago and San Francisco, Bastille Day has been a day has been set aside to give thanks and praise to the Frenchness in our lives. Here, in the North Portland, home of the Saucykitchen, it seems the Bastille Day celebration was this weekend, so I wouldn't say I missed the celebration, I just didn't participate in an event seemingly consisting of – Cooked garlic, Serge Gainsbourg and L'École du micro d'argent blasting on speakers and the air filled with the scent of cigarettes and fireworks - no lie.

Without denying the contributions of the French table, I am a little more Italianate in my approach to food. In the broadest terms Italian cuisine is about the ingredient, French food is about the cook and food can be needlessly complicated, fussy and bureaucratic in the sense there is only ever one sanctioned way to prepare something.

But if there were a special Francophile in my life, I would celebrate the day with an unsophisticated yet worldly omelet cooked in good butter, steamed asparagus, chilled white burgundy and yes a baguette. Or if I were making a celebratory meal for someone a little more Provincial in her outlook – I would go with the roasted garden vegetables, a green salad and an aioli so rich & garlicky you would need to a cigarette and a brandy to wash the lingering flavor from your mouth.

If that day ever comes, I will stock the shelves with the novels of Michel Houellebecq and say asperges as unmidwesternly as possible but until then, my passion for French contributions to life is pretty much restricted to the play of my current favorite Trailblazer, Nicolas Batum

Christian Salter

What is the deal with Christian Salt? - Unrepentant

Fortunately, I don’t have to make fun of this because The Onion has already done so.

This makes me more than a little sad - Eating is nourishment but is also a way to understand the world – growing a tomato helps one fathom the work it takes to get food to the table. Ordering Pad Thai, at the very least, forces you to realize there
is a Thailand. Making borscht helps you think about why the generations of cabbage eaters that came before. All of these experiences can inspire someone to learn about the world they live in. Rather than find out why there is a Kosher Salt and what it is all about, this gentleman took offense and decided to help keep his world small by creating something familiar and comfortable.

Kosher Salt is not preferred in the kitchen because of its innate Jewishness (Historically, not a winning marketing strategy) nor its religious rigor - almost all salt is parve/pareve – that is, it can be used with meat or dairy without violating dietary laws. Kosher Salt is produced by flaking salt into large flat pieces – these flakes dissolve uniformly and because they are bigger than grains of table salt & Kosher Salt helps draw moisture out of food slowly, making it ideal for roasting. That and Kosher Salt is pure; table salt can contain up to 2% of silicone and aluminum, anticaking agents, which means your salt will always pour but also means your pickle brine and pasta water will cloud.

The new Christian Salt doesn’t have specific culinary benefits and ecclesiastically, it is only a salt that has been only blessed by an Episcopalian, on a spiritual level that is pretty underwhelming somewhere between Unitarian low sodium flavoring and a Baptist BBQ Sauce. For really good secular salt, visit The Meadow here.

A good meal, the conviviality that comes with sharing food are forces that can bring people together, seasoning that food should be available for everyone, not just the anointed few.

Excreta, etc, etc.

Saucyman, I had the ubiquitous 4th of July corn on the cob and on a subsequent trip to the bathroom…Well, why does that happen? – Dookie

Cellulose is the culprit here. Along with lignin, cellulose provides structure to a plant making it tall and strong, it is a skeletal(ish) structure for the photosynthesizing set. Humans don’t digest cellulose, so it passes through our digestive system largely in tact. It’s not just people, most animals can't digest it and cellulose is devoid of ethanol, meaning the corn kernel is prized by humans, fodder animals and now oil companies. Termites are the exception, they can and do break down cellulose, turning pulp into food, the ultimate lemonade from indigestible lemons.

Which doesn’t make cellulose useless, what it lacks in fuel it makes up for in fiber – Fiber is vital for our health, yet despite nearly a generation being raised reading the classic Everyone Poops, no one likes to talk about the subject - Except for when people do, they really shouldn’t and even then they should restrict their language to clinical terms.

The Europeans trade representatives recently agreed on a definition of fiber for trade purposes –
"[fiber's] carbohydrate polymers must have a degree of polymerization not lower than three (to exclude mono- and disaccharides)". And while that might seem all lawyerly and silly; especially since it took 15 years to agree on the standards but providing a clear interpretation of words that everyone can agree upon is good, whether for a dictionary or Eurocrats.

For those of us not dealing with tariffs, fiber comes in two forms, soluble and insoluble. Soluble fiber dissolves in water and is thought to be beneficial to gut health and helps beneficial intestinal fauna – think probiotics. Cellulose is insoluble and remains intact as it passes through the digestive system – At this point, and science and understanding are forever changing, insoluble fiber is believed to bond with toxins and DNA damaging materials, removing them from the body.

For corn, the cellulose casing is what you see, but only if you look for it. While it might appear to be whole corn, in reality the edible pulp from the kernel has been digested and its fuel and nutrients have been absorbed into your body, leaving only a hollow yellow shell.

A short entry today because of the subject – to make up for the lack of words here is an article on a different kind of waste.

The Old Man and the River

My Dad is going trout fishing next week: After listening to all the talk of lures, reels, location and the temperament of fish, I will have free fish to show for my pain. Any ideas on how to prepare trout? – Fisherman’s Daughter

There is something about the activity of fishing for trout that inspires or perhaps provokes words. Hemingway wrote a novel about trout fishing called The Sun Also Rises: The book additionally explores the aftermath of war, disillusionment and the consequences of repressed desire. Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It is a love letter to fly fishing/trout. Henry David Thoreau, who surprisingly, on this occasion anyway, did not write as though he invented or at least appreciated trout like no one else ever had before or since, instead he pointed out, “some circumstantial evidence is very strong; as when you find a trout is the milk.” While National Book Award Winner, Paris Trout, is not a cookbook and the plot has nothing to do with either word in the title.

Trout is a pretty versatile fish - it can be fried, poached, steamed or have the BBQ Arts of smoke or flame applied to its preparation. For the old school Trout Au Bleu, a cook conks the fish on the head, removes the gills, treats the skin with vinegar and drops the whole fish into poaching liquid – causing the skin to turn blue and the fish to arch in a crescent – Served with hollandaise, it (the technique, the presentation and a sauce that overwhelms the subtle flesh) is overkill. The best meals are always about the ingredient, not the cook. Better to match flavors to the trout, rather than forcing your will upon it - steaming the fish with julienned ginger, scallions and fermented black beans gives the trout a Chinese flare. Stuffing the cavity with par-cooked rice noodles, fish sauce, shallots, shiitakes and cilantro and before placing in a bamboo steamer is cooking in a Vietnamese style.

The incomparable Richard Olney also stuffs trout, only with sorrel before he bakes his fish with white wine and butter. For those who don’t want to turn their oven on in the summer, there is grilling – keep the skin on and keep in mind it cooks quick, real fast, not enough time to drink half a beer fast. Smoking is better – resulting in a food that is close to lox and can be used to make clamless chowder.

Try a regional variation inspired by 2 French recipes: Meuniere, (coated in flour cooked in clarified butter) and Amandine (topped with almonds). Here this dish takes on a southern flavor as you lightly toast pecans, chop them until they become more like coarse flour than nuts. Fillet your trout, season with salt, coat the trout with pecans, sauté in butter over medium heat until the flesh starts to separate. Keep the southern accent going with a fresh ‘gumbo’ made of baby okra, garlic, cherry tomatoes, cooked red onion and thyme.

It might not seem like it when he is describing a $150 lure, at least your Pop fishes - He could golf, telling all the boring tales of equipment and expeditions without the meal at the end.

Fava-ism

Saucyman, We bought some fava beans over the weekend. I don’t know what to do with them – how to prep them, cook them or what to serve with any ideas? Chianti and beans

The fava has been around, it was the rare legume consumed by hunter-gatherers. As the world became civilized or at least civilizations developed, the fava was a staple of Egyptians and Romans (The Greeks weren’t so keen on the bean or bean eaters). For centuries, the fava was the backbone of nutrition in the Mediterranean, and the plant nourished in different ways: The bean, shelled and cooked, was an important source of protein and the plant, cultivated as winter cover in milder regions or grown next to row crops, doubled as green manure, fertilizing soil with nitrogen.

The importance of the fava has diminished: the domination of New World legumes, dietary changes - Fridays and Lent aren’t the fasting days they used to be and farming practices largely avoid natural fertilizers. Well that and preparing the fava for the table is the single most labor-intensive job involved in the field to table loop. Even the bean’s most ardent supporters gently caution of the work involved – and not the good kind of work either, more of a drudgery – that repetitive, painful, soul-crushing labor that one never sees on cooking shows.

Even if shelling fava beans is the grave digging of the culinary world, there are still a couple of reasons why you would shell, blanch, remove the seed coat and cook the bean. The taste, subtle and sweet, somewhere between a sweet pea and lima bean, it is worth trying. And only after you have personally prepped the beans can you decide if the labor to taste ratio was worth the effort.

It is going to take about 4 pounds of favas in their fuzzy jacket to feed, but not fill, two people. Split the pods open like a sweet pea and set the beans aside. Wait, there’s more: Discard or compost the pods, simmer the beans for about a minute in salted water then rinse under cold water. Take a knife, pierce the skin of the bean and remove the bean from the plasticy skin. Repeat 100s of times. And they still need to be cooked until they are tender - an additional 5 to 10 minutes in water or oil. When complete, that 4 pounds of beans @ $3+ a lb. will yield a little over 8-12oz of still uncooked fava. Yes, that is about $20+ a pound, not counting your labor.

Fresh favas are traditionally paired with lamb. For the veg inclined, simmered in olive oil until soft the favas are a good match with steamed artichokes (or asparagus), lemon, pureed garlic and sea salt. With spaghetti and sharp Romano (and maybe a little prosciutto), favas make a pleasant variation of Pasta e Fagioli; a appetizer type of way, more than a satisfying dinner. Personally, I would follow the lead of Thomas Keller and make my very own Succotash; extending the favas with corn, chives and bell pepper.

I applaud the optimism, curiosity or earnestness that made you pick up favas from the market. Even if you’ll want to weep at the amount of time and money you have sunk into what is ultimately and literally, a handful of beans, that instinct to try new things is a wonderful quality and it is possible you enjoy the beans too.