Just a Man in His Kitchen: Swiss Chard

Frank — Sun, 11 Nov 2012 15:22:25 +0000

Green leafy vegetables are a wonderful thing! No, really, they are! They’re good for you, and they can be a wonderful flavor accompaniment to various dishes. This here is the recipe for the Swiss chard that accompanied my chicken meatloaf. I really like chard as a side for a multitude of different meals. The question most people seem to have, though, is how do you prepare the chard for cooking. Before we discuss recipes, let’s chat a bit about how to actually prep these leaves for cooking!

First, you need to remove the stem. Take the leaf and lay it flat on your cutting board.

Now fold the leaf over along the stem and then use your knife to cut the stem away from the rest of the leaf.

You do not have to cut the leaf completely in half. Cut the stem off at the far end and remove it from the rest of the leaf.

Now that you have the stem removed, complete the same process with all of the leaves. Then, rinse them good with water to get any grit out of them.

Once you have rinsed the leaves and allowed them to try a little, take a handful of them and lay them flat on top of one another. Now roll them up kind of like a cigar and then use your knife to slice the cigar roll into pieces. Your chard is now sliced and ready for cooking!

Ok! Now that we have them chopped up and prepped, here’s what you’ll need for the recipe:

one bunch of Swiss chard (obviously!)
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 small onion, sliced
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 cup chicken stock or broth
1 cup water
olive oil
salt
pepper

Add 2 or 3 tablespoons of oil to a large sauce pan or a stock pot. Add in the onion and let it soften on medium heat for about 2-3 minutes or so. Add in the garlic and stir it about. Let it all cook for about 1-2 more minutes. Now add in your chard leaves in handfuls, stirring as you toss them in. Once you have all of the chard in the pot, add in the chicken stock, water and vinegar. Add in salt and pepper to taste, stir it all about, and then cover it and let it simmer for about 10 minutes or so (or until the leaves have wilted and softened).

Drain the liquid from the chard leaves and you have a tasty, healthy side dish ready for serving!

Just a Man in His Kitchen: Yukon Gold Mashed Potatoes

Frank — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 18:17:14 +0000

Who doesn’t love good mashed potatoes? They’re a great side dish for so many different proteins. These Yukon Gold mashed potatoes were paired with my chicken meatloaf, but they can be paired with just about any protein. One of the pluses to these mashed potatoes is that they do not require butter, so if you are avoiding butter or on a diet, this could be a nice way to get your mashed potato fix! Yukon Gold potatoes have a natural buttery quality to them, so no additional butter is needed in the recipe. Here’s what you need to make these potatoes:

6-8 Yukon Gold potatoes
1 cup low fat or fat free milk plus 1 tbsp lemon juice or white vinegar (or 1 cup buttermilk)
1 cup plain yogurt
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1-2 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp of salt
pepper

Peel and dice the potatoes into cubes. Add them to a saucepan and cover the potatoes with water. Bring the potatoes to a boil and then allow them to simmer for about 5 more minutes. You can test the pieces with a fork to see if they are tender enough and done. Once the potatoes are ready, strain the water from them.

While the potatoes are cooking, make a small batch of sour milk. This is an excellent substitute for buttermilk if you do not have any on hand. Most buttermilk these days is made from low fat or non fat milk, so feel free to use buttermilk in this recipe. But if you do not have any buttermilk on hand, a batch of sour milk will do the trick! To make sour milk, take 1 cup of low fat or non fat milk and add either 1 tbsp of lemon juice or 1 tbsp of white vinegar. Whisk them together and allow them to sit for about 10 minutes. Keep in mind using the lemon juice will add a bit of a very slight tangy citrus flavor.

Whichever form of the milk you decide to use, be sure to add it to a saucepan and allow it to simmer a little to get warm. Why warm the milk, you ask? If you don’t, the milk will make your potatoes cold when you add it (and who wants to eat cold mashed potatoes ?).

Ok… now back to these mashed potatoes! Add the strained potatoes to a bowl and start mashing them by hand with a hand masher. (Yes, we’re doing this the old fashioned way!) Once you’ve got them mashed up pretty well, add in as much of the 1 cup of warm milk as you need. Stir the potatoes with a spoon to get them to the texture you desire. Add in the garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste. If you desire less or more than my recommended measurements of these, have at it! Lastly add in the yogurt and chopped parsley and give it all a good mix. You have mashed potatoes!

Everydayguy » side dishes

Just a Man in His Kitchen: Swiss Chard

Just a Man in His Kitchen: Yukon Gold Mashed Potatoes