World's Best Broccoli

My alert Facebook friends alerted me to a delicious broccoli recipe, and I thought I'd try it. Then I noticed that it requires a 500 degree oven. As it happens, my oven appears to lack insulation, so getting it to 500 degrees requires my kitchen to be pretty darn hot. Someday I'll get a real oven, but until then, I'm going to need to make delicious broccoli on the stovetop. Which I did. And I'll tell you how. It was really easy and even my daughter (who eats about four things) liked it. I do not like broccoli, or at least I didn't, until last night. This one is definitely going to appear regularly.

The ingredients are exactly the same as the original recipe:

2 lbs. broccoli crowns, cut lengthwise

2 T. olive oil

1/2 t. salt

1 t. sugar

black pepper

The cutting lengthwise is really important, and there's a nice photo in the original recipe. This gives a flat surface to caramelize. Mix these together in a bowl. Now heat a skillet over very high heat. Give it all you've got. You're trying to replicate a 500 degree oven. You can't use a nonstick pan for this -- you'll damage the nonstick, and the broccoli won't caramelize. Now go do something else while the pan gets hot. Once it is really, really hot, use tongs to put the broccoli flat side down into the pan. Cover the pan and let it cook for a few minutes. I'm not sure exactly how long I left it there, but probably about 4 minutes. Then I removed the lid and used a sturdy metal spatula to remove the broccoli. Delicious.

Cheese bread

Last week I read the New York Times Magazine article about sugar and how horrible it is. While I love sugar, I recognize that it isn't good for me. The whole sugar-in-any-quantity-is-poison thing doesn't really resonate with me, but I found myself thinking at the end of the article, "I'll quit eating sugar when my lipid specialist says I can eat all the cheese I want." Seriously, I'd trade cheese for sugar, because I love cheese so so so much. The whole lipitor lifestyle makes a lot of cheese ill-advised, so I try to enjoy small amounts of cheese as much as I can. I have a recipe for truly decadent cheese bread, but I make it maybe once a year. Fortunately for me, it is a Cook's Illustrated recipe, and they revamped it in their book America's Test Kitchen Healthy Family Cookbook that I'm always raving about. The recipe is perfect as it is, so go buy the cookbook. It is worth mentioning that it doesn't contain any weird edible non-food substances like fat-free sour cream or fat-free half and half. It uses lowfat buttermilk, whole wheat flour, and less cheese than the original. Here's a photo. It looks better in person, of course!


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