Thursday, May 8, 2014

Finally Mastered cooking Greens!

Guess WHO????  I know, right?  I haven't posted in forever.  I need to get back to it.

I must share.  I have reclaimed my southern girl status.  I finally mastered the art of cooking greens!  After my colossal fail in 2012, I had kinda given up, but pulled up my big girl southern panties and tried again.  Got it right this time!  So what did I do you ask?  Well I'll just tell you!

I probably should have taken pictures, but I didn't think about it at the time.  Maybe next time and I'll add them.  This is how I made them last night and they turned out great.  But every time I cook anything, I end up changing one thing or another.

The first thing I did was took a smoked pork jowl and put it on a rack in my new toy, a Ninja 3 in 1 cooker.  (I love that thing!  I'll try to get some pics of it later)  I call him Papa Smurf, cause he's blue.  Here it is on Amazon  Papa Smurf

Anyway, I didn't season it or anything, just put it on the rack with the skin side down.  I set it on the low crock pot setting and cooked it for about 18 hours.  (Papa Smurf has a keep warm function that comes on automatically when the time runs out, ain't that cool?)

As the jowl cooks, it rendered off the most gorgeous "bacon oil" in the bottom of the pan.  As I cut/shredded/pulled apart the jowl, more of that gorgeous oil was on my cutting board, so you know I didn't waste it!  So to that oily goodness I added a medium white onion that I had diced up,along with a good sized pinch of kosher salt, and set Papa Smurf on High Stove Top cooking and cooked the onions till they were a little translucent.  


So once the onions are nice and perty,  I added my two huge bags of greens, one of Kale, and one of Mustard Greens.  I had to add one bag at a time until it cooked down and made room in the pot.  It took about 10 minutes to make room for the 2nd bag.  I added about 3 cups of chicken base (I use the powdered stuff in a jar and add it to water) and then I let it cook on low for about an hour, and I kept checking it and had to add some more liquid to it at some point.  OH I almost forgot, I added 1/2 teaspoon of red pepper flakes too, just to "kick it up a notch" (and Paula Deen told me to)  And here is the piece-da-resistance!  At the end, right before I turned it off, I added about 1/4 to 1/3 cup of balsamic vinegar. 

It came out really good!  A dish I am proud of.  I liked the combination of the greens I used, and will play with it more with different combinations.

So, do you think I could be let back into the Southern Girls Club now???  But the only thing I should have done that I didn't do, is make cornbread to go with it.

Till next time kids!!!