E is for Escarole

 

 

History:  Escarole is an endive.  The cousin of Dandelion from yesterday, there is a lot to unscramble about all of the Cichorium family. These are all considered Chicory and their uses overlap in a lot of ways, but you can see by the following vegetable names, they look similar in a lot of ways yet their looks are quite different.

• Endive, curly endive, escarole, broad-leaved/Bavarian endive, Batavia endive, grumolo, chicory/frisée, scarola are all part of the Cichorium Endivia family. 
• Chicory, Radicchio, French endive, sugarloaf/witloof/Brussels chicory, Belgian (red) endive, red chicory, succory, Chioggia, Verona, Treviso, Castelfranco (types) are part of the Cichorium Intybus family.

Interestingly, the bullet shaped vegetable with the Endive name is actually not grown in nature.  The name is another important distinction.  Read this Huff post article as I could not say it better myself: How You Pronounce ‘Endive’ Actually Matters, And Here’s Why

Learns about the health benefits of Endive here.  Season: Mid April through September

Indentification:

     

Recipe: - I thought is was called Basta Scalota, turns out, it is Pasta Escarole made in a Bridgeport neighborhood kitchen in Chicago.  This recipe is a soup dish and the escarole can be substituted for any bitter greens.  You could also add canned Indian Peas (discussed on I day) or white beans that have been drained and rinsed.

Ingredients

Yellow Onion, minced

Clove of Garlic, minced

Large bunch of Escarole washed and rough chopped

Olive Oil

Chili Flake to taste

Salt to taste

Angel Hair Pasta ( adjust amount to servings desired)

Method of Production

In a large stock or soup pot, sweat onion and garlic with pinch of salt in Olive Oil

Once fragrant, add the Escarole, pinch of salt and allow to wilt

Add the chili flake to taste

Fill stock pot with appropriate volume of water to cook pasta amount

Simmer greens in the water until desired tenderness

Add Angel hair and cook until Pasta is desired tenderness

Serve soup of  pasta and greens - topped with grated Parmesan

Green City Market's mission statement states that Green City Market is a nationally recognized marketplace model for distributing, promoting and educating about local sustainably-grown food.  In serving that mission, they also include local chefs to help the education process.  Today, Saturday, March 1st, our Chef, Micky Kearns, has the honor of demonstrating his knowledge and enthusiasm for using the freshest, highest quality ingredients and elevating them to their greatest potential.  Whether you came out today to see the demo, heard about it and decided to tune in here, or just stumbled upon this post, we really hope you will visit your local farmer's market and try making this dish.  Your friends and family will marvel at how much flavor you can achieve with simple vegetables.