Molly Watson - Greens + Grains: Recipes for Deliciously Healthful Meals

To remember every moment of positive influence, every supportive comment that wormed its way into my brain, and every skill learned or idea garnered that made this book possible is a Herculean task beyond my abilities. A few, however, stand out so obviously that its easy to name them.

First off, thanks to Sarah Billingsley and everyone else at Chronicle Books. You are a pleasure to work with, plain and simple. Also a big thanks to Doe Coover for having my back.

Im lucky to have an amazing cadre of fellow writers and food folks to whom I can turn for advice, feedback, and inspiration. To name them all would be absurd. For this book Bruce Cole, Naomi Fiss, Clare Leschin-Hoar, Cheryl Sternman Rule, and Heidi Swanson had specific and notable impact.

On a more personal level, many friends cheered me on with their enthusiasm for this project, put up with conversations oddly centered on chard while I was working on these recipes, and, even better, distracted me with tales of their own greens- and grains-free existences. Jordanna Bailkin, Tara Duggan, Julianne Gilland, Juliet Glass, Frank Marquardt, Kate Ronald, Jess Vacek, and Kate Washington did the heavy lifting on all three fronts for this book.

My family is filled with food enthusiasts. I am grateful to all of them, many of whom have cheerfully tolerated being served the results of my recipe work over the years. My parents, Mary and Steve Watson, have put up with me hijacking family vacation menus for years. A special thanks is owed to Sam Watson and Marianne Condrup for downing many of the results in this tome with good humor, no matter how weird the dinners got (four versions of stuffed cornmeal cakes with a side of stuffed chard and some borscht, anyone?). Im also indebted to my three sisters-in-law Mary Theodore, Heidi Watson, and Michelle Wolf. Smart, accomplished women who, know it or not, serve as my imaginary audience every time I write a recipe.

My greatest thanks go to the most appreciative yet honest eaters a cook and writer could hope for: Steven and Ernest. You two ate everything in this book, often many times over, with enthusiasm, spot-on feedback, and (almost) no complaints. And that is truly the least of why I am grateful for you both.

Copyright 2014 by Molly Watson.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.

ISBN 978-1-4521-3302-7 (epub, mobi)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available.

ISBN 978-1-4521-3159-7 (pb)

Designed by Alice Chau
Photographs by Joseph De Leo
Food styling by Christine Albano
Prop styling by Kira Corbin

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Chronicle Books LLC
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Greens and grains have slowly but steadily taken over my kitchen.

In spring its tangled masses of pea greens, intense stinging nettles, and tender but bitter dandelion greens. Next, peppery watercress and wild arugula, lemony sorrel, spongy buoyant spinach, and nutty fava leaves show up. Then come pliant grape leaves, piles of brilliantly green Swiss chard with bright white stems, and bunches of fresh leaves with beets or turnips still attached to the stalks. Hearty kales and collard greens (not to mention the usually discarded but deliciously edible leaves of broccoli and kohlrabi) see me through most of the winter.

Where bags and jars of long-grain rice and rolled oats used to stand, the shelves are now full of bulgur and barley, farro and quinoa, buckwheat groats and wild rice. The sheer variety of brown riceshort grain, sweet, medium, jasminetaking up the cupboard can seem absurd, but I turn to each of them often and for different effects.

Everyone may not be as greens-mad and grains-obsessed as I am, but once you get used to the range of flavors and textures they add to meals, its tough to turn back. While Im a fan of most vegetables and all the leafy green things I can think of, this book focuses specifically on greens like spinach and chard and kale that can be cooked. Similarly, I zero in on whole grains that are truly whole, not ground into flour. There are a few exceptions to that rule, but only because a dish was so darn tasty that I couldnt resist .

Then, I bring them together. Every recipe contains greens and whole grains. From a light salad of fluffy quinoa and peppery arugula

I dont eat a ton of meat, but Im far from a vegetarian. These recipes reflect that. I use a bit of pancetta here and some broth there; those ingredients are always optional. There are a few seafood meals and a chicken dinner, some ground lamb or turkey. This is all simply how I like to cook. Many of the recipes just happen to be dairy free or vegan or gluten free. None of those are rubrics that I follow or think about much, but if you do, youll find dishes to cook from these pages.

Not that long ago, it would have been difficult to imagine a book filled with recipes using kale and spelt that wasnt a health book. For some people, I suppose such a thing is still tricky to understand. Yet where so many regard hearty greens and whole grains with an eye toward their role in a healthful diet, I see them first and foremost as delicious.

Greens are leaves, plain and simple.

I am no botanist. Nor am I an avid or even successful gardener. When Im cookingand eatingI care mostly about how a green tastes and how it can be cooked and am not all that concerned about its family or genus. I consider how strong its bitter edge is, from the bright spiciness of mustard greens to the intense slap of collard greens. I think of the texture, from soft and tender pea greens to stiff and tough kale. Then I account for how cooking either brings out its bitterness (spinach) or tames it (dandelion greens).

Once Ive weighed all these factors, I go ahead and use greens interchangeably, simply adjusting cooking times and seasonings along the way. I encourage you to do the same.

There are more than a dozen greens listed here, organized from delicate to hearty and grouped by those that can substitute for each other. Most grocery stores, however, limit their stock to a half dozen. Fresh herbs, arugula, spinach, chard, kale, and collard greens are fairly easy to find in most locales. Mustard greens, watercress, escarole, and turnip greens may also be regulars, depending on regional preferences. Large supermarket chains are unlikely, though, to carry fava greens, purslane, or fresh grape leaves. For now, such items are still intensely seasonal and need to be sought out at farm stands, natural foods co-ops, and specialty stores.

Luckily, they are, at heart, all green leaves. Every recipe in this book will work using parsley for an herb, spinach for quick-cooking greens, or kale for longer-cooking greens.

Spinach is the gateway green. Widely available and widely cooked, its the first green most people have eaten in a cooked form instead of tossed in a salad. While Im all for people eating cooked greens, spinach, so mild and mellow when raw, develops a slightly bitter, even metallic or tannic, edge when cooked. This edge, as creamed spinach aficionados can attest, can be dulled with fat, most particularly butter, cream, or cheese.