Buttered Brussels Sprouts: Coles de Bruseles con Mantequilla

Oh, you're gonna love this.



And, by the way, they're called Brussels Sprouts - four S's: two in the middle of bruSSels and one at the end (brusselS) plus the one at the end of sproutS. Although if you had only one sprout I guess it would be a Brussels Sprout_ after all. But they do tend to be in groups rather than dealt with individually. The important thing being that there's always an S at the end of Brussels; it's the name a a very nice city in Belgium; half French and half Dutch. I once missed a train connection there.

The 2nd by the way is that Brussels sprouts have tested as effective against mammary carcinogenesis in Sprague-Dawley rats. They might be anti-carcinogenic.

It's nearing the end of the true BS season and so I'm doing them again before it's too late. This one's more or less according to the bible, Mastering the Art of French Cooking by the lovingly remembered Julia Child (no S at the end there). Page 450 for those following along at home

There's two steps to this and one secret to success. The secret is - don't overcook the damn things or they'll end up tasting sulfurous. Bah! The two steps are 1) Blanching and 2) Cooking.

So, this is what I actually did…

Ingredients

• 450 gr Brussels Sprouts [1#]
• ¼ t salt
• ¼ t pepper, white
• ¼ C butter
• ¼ C salt (for the boiling water)
• 1 sheet pastry paper [waxed paper]
  
  
• large glass casserole (to put the sprouts in a single layer)

Procedure

Oven at 175C [350F]

Step 1 - Blanching them

1. Trim the base of each sprout
2. Peel any grungy outer leaves
3. Poke a cross in the base of each sprout (to ensure even & rapid cooking) with the your knife
4. Boil an exceedingly large pot of water (that way the sprouts won't drop the temp too low when you toss them in) - high heat.
5. Toss in the sprouts & return to a boil then lower the heat
6. Boil softly for 6 minutes
7. Then dump into a colander [sieve] and rinse with cold water (so that they're not too hot to handle)

Step 2 - Into the oven

1. Coat the casserole lightly with some butter
2. Coat the paper lightly with some butter
3. Melt the rest (most) of the butter
4. Put the sprouts into a glass casserole in a single layer
• heads up
5. Drizzle butter over Brussels Sprouts
• melt some more and drizzle if you run out half way through (I know I would [and did])
6. Sprinkle lightly with salt & pepper
7. Cover loosely with the buttered paper
8. Bake for 15 minutes
9. == Done ==

Serve warm

Notes

1. Fresh fresh fresh. Get decent sprouts. Not soft ones which will not cook nicely at all.
   
2. All the sprouts should be the same size. Toss any that are twice as big as the rest - or twice as small.
3. You can blanch these things up to a day ahead and stash them in the fridge
4. Always blanch Brussels Sprouts (and toss the water out). I believe it eliminates some bitterness
   

Brussel Sprouts in Sour Cream

Since I had a rather a lot of brussel sprouts I had to find something different to do with the rest of them.

¡Really! This one's quite nice too. It takes the dreaded sprouts and casseroles them with bacon and quark / kwark; topped with a little browned bread crumbs. Just love quark too; sort of a smooth cottage cheese type of thing.

Okay, and as a concession to those consider sprouts bitter, mushy, nose-wrinkling wads of cruciferous terror (to quote Orangette) one might consider substituting green beans.

Ingredients:

• 500 g brussel sprouts [1#]
• 50 g chopped bacon [2 oz]
  
• 200 g quark [7 oz]
  
• 2 T bread crumbs
• Salt & pepper
  
• Olive oil
  

Procedure:

1. Wash; trim discolored leaves from sprouts; hack off some of stubby bottom
   
2. Blanch in boiling water 2 minutes (eliminates any bitterness)
3. While that's happening, fry up the chopped bacon a little bit to soften the bits (and get rid of some of the fat)
   
4. Drain sprouts and rinse with cold water (to stop them cooking)
5. Quarter the sprouts, vertically
6. Mix sprouts with quark & bacon, season with salt & pepper and dump into casserole dish
• Top very lightly with bread crumbs
  
7. Into the 175°C [350F] oven for 10 minutes
8. Then under the broiler for 5 (to brown the breadcrumbs)
   

Notes:

1. Optionally, top with cheese too - although that adds a whole mess of calories and fat and might overwhelm the taste of the sprouts
2. Veggie substitutions might include green beans, asparagus
   

Brussel Sprouts & Water Chestnuts

Love those brussel sprouts! Really.
Hated them until I moved to Holland and discovered what good fresh vegetables tasted like. And that brussel sprouts can be a taste treat (instead of a gaseous horror).

The picture maybe looks a bit of a mess but that's mostly my fotog skills; 'm still saving for a new camera. The one I've got dates from 1999. A Toshiba PDR-M1 which has an astounding 1.5 megapixels.

Ingredients:

• 500 gr brussel sprouts - fresh [1#]
• 200 gr water chestnuts [6 oz]
• 2 T olive oil - virgin
  
• 1 T soy sauce
• Salt & ground white Pepper
  

Procedure:

1. Wash; trim discolored leaves from sprouts; hack off some of stubby bottom
   
2. Cut in fine julienne (slivers)
3. Blanch in boiling water 3 minutes (eliminates any bitterness)
   
4. Slice water chestnuts in 1/3rds or ¼s or something (while the sprouts are a-boiling)
5. Drain sprouts and rinse with cold water (to stop them cooking)
6. Oil into a frying pan
7. Add sprouts to pan
• Stir around and saute a little
• maybe a minute and a half
8. Add water chestnuts
• Stir around and saute a little
• maybe a minute and a half
9. Add soy sauce (for color & a little flavour
10. Check if it needs salt & pepper
• Probably just some white pepper
11. Best enjoyed hot
    

- Done -

Come to think of it… this is simply a stir-fry; they never look very fancy. I'll have to try this again and change the presentation. Perhaps frying the sprouts lightly, and the water chestnuts separately (cut in equaly fine julienne), then plating the sprouts, sprinkling with soy sauce, then the water chestnuts over the sprouts. Might make for a more picturesque setting.