Rabbit Food for Lions
Bitter Greens in Sage-Garlic broth
Kale in Sage-garlic broth
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1 tablespoon Olive Oil
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1 Shallot, finely chopped
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1 tablespoon Fresh Sage, chiffanode cut
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4 cloves Roasted Garlic, finely chopped
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2 tablespoons Marsala or Dry Sherry
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1 teaspoon Sherry Vinegar
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3-4 cups Vegetable or Chicken Broth
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Salt to taste
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1 bunch Kale
In pot over medium heat put oil, chopped shallot, garlic and fresh sage. Sauté until sage crisps and garlic softens or begins to brown slightly. Add vinegar and sherry, and allow the liquids to reduce by 1/4-1/2.
Then add broth, continue to cook until the liquids reduce again by about 1/2. Salt to taste. Add Kale and cook until Kale beings to soften and intensify its color.
We hear “rabbit food” and think all that’s bad about dieting. Dull, lifeless, uninspiring. Not our thing — fitness and fine food should both enliven your experience of life, not deaden it. So the food Kevin and Russ cook, and the techniques and philosophy they share, turn standard rabbit food and make it fit for a lion. Read more about our cooking philosophy in the Second Helping Toolbox.
Lord knows we Southerners haven’t met a vegetable we can’t throw a ham hock in.
Well, both from a foodie and a weight loss perspective, that’s a problem. A standard cooking concept is “if it doesn’t benefit the dish’s flavor or texture, it shouldn’t be in there” — in which case, you don’t even need the greens.
And of course adding a ton of fat/sugar into everything just doesn’t work if you’re managing your weight — regardless of if/when you met goal.
Well Kevin, bless his little Yankee heart, came to the rescue. Instead of a ton of saturated fat, Kevin opted instead to create a highly flavorful broth and reduced it to even further increase its intensity. He designed the broth to accentuate and counterpoint the bitterness of greens such as Kale, Mustard or Turnip greens.
The idea here is to replace saturated fat — a rather one-note flavor, by cook standards — with a highly-layered array of herbs, spices and other flavors that boast a much higher benefit-to-cost ratio. From a weight loss standpoint, you eek out far more flavor with this approach than a piece of pig.
As an added bonus, the Sage-Garlic broth makes an excellent soup base.
One last tip — you have completely control over the flavor intensity of this dish, particularly because it calls for reducing the liquids twice. Reducing is the liquid equivalent to roasting in that both deepen and intensify flavor. We usually take the time to reduce both liquids by half. If you don’t have the time or don’t want the greens to knock you down with flavor (hey, it can happen), simply don’t let the liquids cook for as long.
– Russ Lane
