Spinach Glorious Spinach

[tod2]

I have to find some really superb spinach recipes - mainly for salad.
I have a vague first time memory of eating Swiss Chard leaves salad with , hard boiled egg, bacon and a sweet/sour vinarette dressing - at least 55 years ago. Sometime in my 20's when taken out to dine by hard to think that far back. All I know is I died and went to heaven. What a delicious combination!

I will try and recreate it tomorrow as a side dish. I am reserving the bacon fat to mix with red wine vinegar and sugar for the dressing. Unless there is something better.

[kerouac2]

I grew up eating canned spinach and always loved it. (I would probably be stoned by most other children from that era for writing that.) My mother would use butter to heat it and chop up some garlic and put a hard boiled egg on top.

For some reason, in my adult life, I have eaten very little spinach except in salad form. That might just be because there is so much more vegetal variety available now because I never stopped liking likng spinach.

In the last year or so, I have started eating a bit of canned spinach again. I assume that my second childhood has begun.

[casimira]

Spinach is glorious indeed. Likely one of my favorite greens. 
I don't believe I have eaten much canned spinach as it grew/grows prolifically almost every place I ever lived.
Here in NOLA it's already making a presence at some of the farmer's markets and some groceries.
It's one of those greens that one can stagger planting it in order to have an ongoing crop to pick all during the autumn and winter.

I love a spinach salad with sliced roasted beets, red onion, bacon bits and crumbled feta or bleu cheese. Dressed with a balsamic vinaigrette. Heavenly!

[kerouac2]

The fresh spinach I buy (to cook) is always Chinese spinach from the Chinese supermarket. It tastes exactly the same as "normal" spinach but the leaves are smaller. Luckily it is no longer flown in from Thailand or Vietnam but grown in the Paris metropolitan area, at least during the warm season. When I buy spinach for salad, it is the French stuff in a bag.

[lugg]

I love spinach but my favourite way of eating it is not a salad but creamed so my way ....
Wilt spinach .,.. squeeze dry ... add crème fraiche or cream , season with salt and pepper , nutmeg to taste ( I add lots) , spoon of butter and blitz

or you can make it more complicated

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/may/01/nigel-slater-classic-creamed-spinach

[kerouac2]

"Epinards à la crème" is one of the most common ways to buy frozen spinach here.

[patricklondon]

A simple lunch I had in Austria once and have made several times since: steamed spinach on a potato rösti, with a fried egg on top

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[mich64]

That sounds so good that Patrick.

My mother used to boil spinach often. I loved it with melted butter and a couple dashes of vinegar and pepper. This summer I mixed spinach with romaine lettuce when making ceasar salads. I also like spinach salads with bacon and boiled eggs or pickled eggs with a Thousand Island salad dressing.

[kerouac2]

I wonder who discovered decided that spinach goes well with boiled eggs.

[mickthecactus]

This is Fordhook Giant, the chard I am growing this year.

[fumobici]

My mother made boiled spinach with a little butter and lemon which I liked just fine. Not hugely different than canned. It's probably been a couple of years since I've bought any at the market. In Italy it's mostly seen in mixed green salads at cafes or as a ravioli filling with ricotta.

[bjd]

I only tasted canned spinach once. My mother-in-law preferred canned vegetables to fresh -- fortunately she rarely cooked. Anyway, I thought it was awful. But fresh spinach with the water evaporated and with some bechamel sauce or cream is good, especially on fish.

In Italy, alla fiorentina seems to mean that it has spinach on whatever you are eating.

[fumobici]

In Italy, alla fiorentina seems to mean that it has spinach on whatever you are eating.

This is true but you almost never see dishes "alla fiorentina" on menus anymore* but for the perennial bistecca alla fiorentina, which of course has no spinach at all.

*in Italy, in US Italian restaurants it's a different story

[lagatta]

Beautiful chard. He we are a bit past the best season for spinach, so fresh young chard replaces it in certain dishes.

The Pasqualina/Pascualina (Easter Pie) is made with chard in Argentina, as of course Easter is in autumn in the Austral hemisphere. In the winter I buy frozen spinach (little green turds). I don't think I've ever eaten tinned spinach.

[onlyMark]

I'm glad you all like spinach. I seem to be different. I dislike the stuff even after having it made in many different styles over the years and can only tolerate it when teamed up with feta or similar cheese and judiciously covered in pastry of one form or another.
As for adding cream to it.... bleargh.

[mickthecactus]

I love spinach but only cook it one way. If it is a large leaf like the chard above I strip it off the midrib, wash it in cold water, tear it up and drain it. It then goes in a pan with a knob of butter on full heat and stirred for a couple of minutes until totally wilted the drained in a colander and all the excess moisture pressed out with back of a spoon.
Frozen spinach is excellent in Indian sag dishes.

[lugg]

Sept 15, 2021 5:42:54 GMT patricklondon said:

simple lunch I had in Austria once and have made several times since: steamed spinach on a potato rösti, with a fried egg on top

That sounds so good and I think I will try to have a go at recreating it

Mick - your chard looks magnificent

[kerouac2]

I kind of feel sorry for people who have never eaten canned vegetables. Not only are they sometimes superior in nutrients to fresh vegetables, but they are available 12 months of the year.

[mich64]

I have never tried canned spinach but I do eat other canned vegetables, green and yellow beans and carrots. We do use frozen spinach to make a popular dip that is served with pumpernickel bread.

[bjd]

Sept 15, 2021 21:04:50 GMT kerouac2 said:

I kind of feel sorry for people who have never eaten canned vegetables. Not only are they sometimes superior in nutrients to fresh vegetables, but they are available 12 months of the year.

I buy frozen vegetables when I can't get seasonal ones, especially peas. But I find canned vegetables tend to be soggy and don't taste as good.

[kerouac2]

Yes, of course. But when you are as old as I am, you remember the time before most frozen foods.

[tod2]

Snap Mick! I have the Giant Fordhook mostly but also planted a smaller flat thin stemmed leaf spinach. I used that with a few tiny inner chard leaves for my salad yesterday.

I'm sorry to hear you strip the leaves off the chard....The rib is the best part! I slice the white rib first then then rest of the leaf with the rest of the rib attached. Separating the two piles I put the sliced ribs in first with a little butter and put the leafy part on top. When it shows it is wilting I mix it all up with salt and pepper and crushed garlic- and more butter. I do admit that when the white stems/ribs are very wide and flat they can become stringy so either peel them or toss the large part.

[patricklondon]

Sept 15, 2021 17:13:48 GMT mich64 said:

That sounds so good that Patrick.

It was a walking holiday in Austria, and I was just in a mood for something with egg and potato, and that's what turned up at the café where we stopped. AND the spinach was there to make it virtuous.

[mich64]

Sept 16, 2021 16:56:48 GMT patricklondon said:

AND the spinach was there to make it virtuous.

Yes, the added spinach made it a sensible and good choice!

(We are supposed to be in Austrian Alps at this moment!)

[kerouac2]

Our discussion caused me to buy some Chinese spinach yesterday.

[tod2]

Yes Yes Yes! Thats the one I have in my garden beside Fordhook Giant Chard.