Three Spring Onions That Really Enhance the Flavor
Spring has come, and she brings with her all kinds of delicious onions. From the hot ramp to the sweet green garlic, these parts of the plant next to the onion give a fresh and zesty flavor to everything they touch.
Build up
If you follow any cooking media, you’ve probably noticed that chefs are losing their onion-loving minds over a little thing called a ” ramp .” They are sometimes called “wild leeks”, but they are not as fun to say as “ramps”. (Fun fact: restaurateur and former MasterChef judge Joe Bastianich has a band called The Ramps. Let’s hear them.)
Anyway. These thin and delicate little men look like small leeks with wide green leaves. Ramps are shady objects obtained from dark wooded areas. Their pungent, garlic, onion flavors and short season (usually late April to early June) make them very popular, but you can find them at your local farmer’s market or trendy pants stores like Whole Foods.
They can cost a lot ($ 20 a pound, according to Eater ), so prepare a game plan and make sure you eat everything from the onion to the tip of the leaf. In my opinion, ramps are best handled simply. Bon Appetit recommends grilling them whole with a little olive oil, salt and pepper , then double the flavor by making a vinaigrette with chopped onions, some oil and sherry vinegar, dijon and a little honey. …
If you decide you love ramps so much that you just want to water them all your life, you can make pesto in a simple 1: 2: 2: 8 ratio (1 part nuts, 2 parts butter, 2 parts grater). cheese, 8 parts leaves or herbs), plus garlic, lemon, salt and pepper to taste . Stir with pasta, spread on bread, eat with a spoon; you guys know what to do with pesto.
There is also nothing wrong with eating them raw, chopped and sprinkled with good bread and butter, or as a side dish with anything that benefits from garlic and onion health benefits. (So basically everything except ice cream?)
Ramps are best stored in the refrigerator, wrapped in a damp paper towel and placed in an unsealed plastic bag. They will make the fridge smell like garlic, but that’s no worse than the fridge can smell. If you’re worried about running out of your stock of ramps before they go bad, we can fix that. For two pounds of ramps, Saver recommends a tablespoon of salt, a cup of white vinegar, a cup of sugar, a teaspoon each of mustard seeds, pink peppercorns, and white peppercorns; half a teaspoon of fennel seeds, caraway seeds and caraway seeds; plus one bay leaf. After that, just a little boiling, stirring and cooling, and then you have delicious pickles that keep in the refrigerator for two weeks.
Shoot with garlic stalks
Everyone knows what to do with a garlic bulb, but what about the tangled, curly stalks that sprout out of tough-necked garlic bulbs? These are garlic stalks and they are delicious. Cuttings are usually harvested in late spring or early summer, shortly before they begin to bloom. They are crunchy, soft and sweet, similar to garlic and shallots, and have a less aggressive (but still present) garlic flavor than an onion. Garlic stalks look and feel like pods and can be eaten raw or cooked, just remember to remove the fibrous ends.
Not sure what to do with them? Just use them like any leek-like onion. Fry them whole and serve as a side dish, chop and deep-fry or blanch and add to salads. My favorite pastime is replacing them with green beans in nicoise salad for a spicier meal. As with the ramps above, pesto is a pretty good use of ham. You can add them to your basic basil pesto, or make a batch without additives for a very garlic flavor. The stems are great in hummus too, just toss in a couple of chopped stems and move quickly. In fact, almost everything that we covered with ramps can be applied to the scape: grilling, pickling, everything is fine.
If you want your skulls to get fatter (and why not), consider making some complex skull butter. If you’re unfamiliar with the wonders of complex butter, the video above (and our fun guide to dairy products ) will walk you through this very simple and delicious process.
Sea stalks are stored for a couple of weeks in a plastic bag in the refrigerator and up to a month in the freezer, but I don’t think they will last that long. Plus there is always pickling – the most delicious way to prolong the life of anything.
Go for Greener Garlic
Another gift of spring is green garlic, young garlic that is harvested before the bulb is fully formed. It arrives in early spring, so keep an eye out for the farmers’ market or CSA box. Basically, it’s a young garlic that has a cute pink onion attached to a long shallot-like stem. Like most young people, these unripe onions are softer, sweeter, float better, and can be eaten both boiled and raw. (I think you can eat ripe garlic raw, but that’s a little rough. I don’t know you, you might be a badass smacking raw garlic bulbs).
Since it retains less heat, it’s a great way to add some garlic flavor to delicate dishes that can be easily overpowered, like scallops, or for people who are easy to overpower with garlic, like my father. Although softer than adult garlic, it’s still more aggressive than, say, regular green onions, and the green stem can be used to add extra punch to eggs, rice dishes, or anything else you’d put green on. onion.
Aside from being “used like regular garlic,” there are some areas where green garlic overshadows its old ones. It’s great for salads like this Barley Salad from The Kitchn , which combines barley, green garlic, toasted almonds, sugar chunks and mint for a super fresh and super flavorful dish. For a more filling, but not overly heavy breakfast, these tender potato tortillas use both green garlic and garlic for a savory, crunchy and delicious snack.
Of course, there is always pesto. In fact, I can’t think of a sauce or pasta that doesn’t benefit from the sweet and savory additions that green garlic brings, so you should probably just mix it with everything.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get to the farmers’ market so I can stock up on these delicious treats and really cook my food. (Sorry. I’m sorry.)