[lively music]
People just don’t know how to do vegetables.
I love to cook vegetables,
and I’m here to show you how to cook vegetables
in a way that might blow your mind,
but also great tips that we do at restaurants
that people at home don’t know.
I’m Hillary Sterling,
and this is how I cook restaurant-quality vegetables.
[lively music]
So I came up with this idea
because I wanted to cook a zucchini and eggplant
in a different way than I ever have before.
We can always saute and sear and smoke and poach
and I even confit in chicken fat sometimes,
but I kept seeing salt-baked fish everywhere,
and I was always intrigued by the texture of it
and the flavor, and especially when you crack it open,
that steam is released.
So I decided to try salt-baked zucchini.
So you want to make sure that your zucchini
and eggplant are relatively the same size.
The biggest step that’s really important here is to
make sure that we pierce the skin on the zucchini.
This will allow the salt to get in
and some of that moisture to be released.
You see all that liquid that’s coming out?
But the salt’s gonna draw out some of that liquid
and then allow the rest of it to steam inside.
It has a texture of like some version of the vegetable
that it once was, but now it is so creamy on the inside.
And a lot of times when you’re sauteing it,
you have a hard time getting the exterior
and the interior at the same time being cooked the same way.
So what we’re doing, the salt bake,
this allows us to cook in its entirety
where it is cooked evenly throughout.
Basically, we’re creating a warm and cosy environment
to keep all the moisture in,
but also season at the same time.
So these are Japanese eggplant.
One of the easiest ones to cook,
and especially for salt bake, it’ll cook completely even.
Not bitter at all, super sweet and creamy.
Now we have to make the salt bake.
This may appear like a lot of salt,
and I know salt’s expensive, but save this when you’re done
because you can absolutely use it again.
It’s completely shelf stable once you’re done with it.
Put it back in a Robot-Coupe, or a food processor, at home,
and it’s ready to go one more time.
This is a kosher salt. None of that fine stuff.
You don’t want fine stuff.
You want to make sure it has some texture
because it has to absorb the egg whites.
I have a toasted fennel seed, and toasted coriander seed.
Some sweetness, some nuttiness, some earthiness,
and some orange zest.
Those residual oils that are coming off land right in there.
The salt bake removes some of that excess moisture
that sometimes vegetables have that watery quality to them
and then add so much flavor back into it.
Mix this in, then we’re gonna add our egg whites.
The egg whites help to complete the hardening of it.
You’re basically gonna mix this to a wet sand consistency.
Good sandcastle building sand.
So now you can see that I can put my hand print in there
and it sticks so it’s ready to go.
Nice cozy bed we’re building here.
Kind of push them in so they stay in place.
And let’s bury them.
So now that we have our zucchini and eggplant buried,
we’re gonna wrap them up and get them right in the oven.
We’re gonna throw these in an oven at 400 degrees
for approximately 30 to 40 minutes.
The crust is nice and hard. There’s no resistance at all.
So that’s telling me that this is done.
Once it’s done, you should really remove it
from the salt bake so it doesn’t keep cooking.
There’s nothing more exciting than breaking open this
and finding two perfectly cooked vegetables waiting inside.
You can see that the salt, it actually didn’t stick to them.
It’s so good. You can taste the eggplant coriander fennel.
It’s seasoned perfectly
and the consistency is really, truly amazing.
It’s not hard on the outside
and it’s not too soft on the inside.
Now that the zucchini is 100% cooked,
even the stem is now edible, which is really amazing.
That’s the way zucchini should taste.
I can taste all the salt-baked spices, orange,
but what I do taste first is the actual grassiness
and the sweetness of zucchini.
There are so many different ways to cook zucchini.
When you’re adding other things and elements to it,
like a grill or wood fire or garlic and oil,
those things can overpower something so subtle
as this zucchini.
Right now, this salt bake brings out
all of the amazing flavors of the actual zucchini.
This technique is so versatile.
You can use it in every season from zucchini, to squash,
to beets, to celery root, to potatoes.
It’s super easy to do,
but it takes a lot of salt, but I think it’s worth it.
And don’t forget to save that salt for next time.
[lively music]
We’re gonna saute some spinach.
I think cooking a vegetable in this way
with this fast heat and imparting so much flavor
with three or four simple ingredients is really great
to have in your back pocket at all times.
So we have our cloves of garlic.
For me, I use a towel,
and basically what I’m gonna do is,
I’m just gonna smash this and then peel the outside,
put it in the oil so that it just infuses it.
And then we’re gonna remove it
before the spinach gets in there.
What that does is ensures that the garlic does not burn.
And then we’re gonna cut one cheek off the lemon
to squeeze into it.
Take your seeds out before we go.
One of the things we always talk about
in our kitchen is lemon and go.
You should not put the lemon back on the heat
because that brightness that we’re looking for
is going to disappear once you cook it.
Do not put anything in your pan until it’s hot.
You want it warm. We’re gonna coat that bottom.
Smashing that garlic helps it infuse faster
because there’s more surface area around the garlic.
And that golden brown is what we’re looking for.
Take your garlic out right before you think you need to.
Once that garlic is infused in the oil, we’ll remove it,
reserve it for later, and then we can always add it back in.
So now we’re gonna go in with our spinach.
It’s gonna make a lot of noise.
I find the biggest missteps in sauteing greens is
not building the layers of flavor.
Right off the bat, this is when we’re gonna add that salt.
We’re gonna add a little bit more olive oil,
which is gonna reduce that cooking temperature and lower it.
It looks like a lot of spinach,
but I promise you this is gonna cook down.
We’re going to add our chili flake.
We’re gonna turn the heat off.
We’re gonna add our lemon juice.
One quick. Great.
You can smell the lemon. So bright.
Lemon juice has acidity.
Lemon zest has oils that are floral
and has a different flavor profile than lemon juice.
So now we have our sauteed greens that took two minutes,
and we’re gonna go right to the plate with them.
And what we’ve also created is a wonderful pan sauce
for them of garlic, lemon and chilies.
That looks great. Look at that.
Super tender. The spinach has really mild flavor.
It’s super gentle.
And what this does is gives the garlic
and chilies and lemon a vehicle.
And with the stems in there, that’s also balancing out
because now we have two different textures.
You can give me this and I’d be happy for dinner.
[lively music]
Poaching is a great way to cook certain kinds of vegetables
so that they’re cooked evenly.
And I think that’s kind of the theme of today of showing
how to cook vegetables in a way that is even, approachable,
flavorful, and almost so accessible.
Poaching is a cooking method that is under a liquid.
Most people are familiar with like poached eggs.
Same concept where you’re covering your artichokes
in this liquid that we’re going to then slowly simmer.
Artichokes most of the time are signal for spring,
but they are available all year round.
Thank you, California.
And people are super afraid of them
and they’re so flavorful.
They seem really labor intensive for a weeknight meal.
On a day that you have time, grab a couple of artichokes.
And then once you’re done cooking them
in this olive oil poaching liquid,
just let them stay in there
and they’ll stay for a week in your fridge.
If we’re gonna poach in a liquid,
we want to put so much flavor in the liquid
so that the actual vegetable takes all of that love, right?
So the white wine adds acid and some sweetness.
The olive oil is grassy and fruity.
And the water just kind of stretches it out.
And we’re gonna throw our thyme sprig and bay leaf.
You know those bay leaves they get in the jars of the store?
They’ve been sitting in those jars for a really long time.
If you can find fresh bay leaves,
they’re really great to keep in your fridge
and they have so much more flavor and better flavor.
It’s time to clean an artichoke.
One of the things we teach cooks early on is to
get your stuff set up so that you’re putting your knife down
the least amount of times as possible.
So if you clean this artichoke and then start turning it,
and then you put your knife down
and then do that three more times,
you’ve just lost many, many seconds in your day.
So we have a serrated knife and a pairing knife.
Both can be used to clean the artichokes.
I prefer to cut the tops off with a serrated
and clean the rest with a pairing knife.
There’s a lot of great benefits
of using this poaching liquid
because it imparts a lot of flavor to it.
It also preserves them.
We use this method for sunchokes, salsify, fennel,
potatoes, some other root vegetables.
What is our cartouche?
We take this amazing handy piece of parching paper
and then we’re going to use it as a cover.
So it fits snugly inside the pot.
Keep that on a low simmer for anywhere
from about 15 to 20 to 25 minutes.
Look at those beautiful artichokes.
The color on them is like super bright and yellow.
As opposed to the zucchini, with these artichokes,
we want a slight bit of resistance.
We don’t want them to be mush.
This poaching liquid really imparts so much flavor to them
and then tenderizes those exterior leaves.
They have super sweetness,
almost a slight bitterness in the end,
and this like insane earthy quality to them
that kind of blow you away.
This poaching method works because it cooks it all the way.
All of those different textures and layers
of the artichoke all the same way,
all consistently every time.
[lively music]
The next method that we are gonna dig into
is the triple blanching method for green vegetables.
Asparagus and some broccoli and some frozen peas.
Frozen peas, honestly, they’re super delicious
and a great way to keep in your freezer
for a quick weeknight meal.
So asparagus, a lot of times you’ll see this end
where it’s white.
You should break it
and it’ll tell you where it wants to be broken.
One of my favorite things to do is snap asparagus.
You want to cut this broccoli
into kind of even pieces, not too small though.
The bigger they are, the easier they are to blanch
and the more tender and flavorful they are.
What do we do with this?
I actually almost sometimes prefer the stem
to the actual floret.
They’re so good and so sweet.
We salt our blanching water and we salt our shocking water.
Because if you put your vegetables
that are really well seasoned in a blanching water
and then into a basically plain bath,
you’re basically gonna to wash away all of those flavors
in that seasoning.
Blanching is the act of putting a raw vegetable
into a boiling water to begin the cooking process.
So what this does is a three times method is that
it keeps the vegetable cooking without it deteriorating.
So it also keeps the flavor locked in.
It keeps the color and it keeps the texture locked in.
One of the most important things
about seasoning blanching water is to actually taste it.
It’s somewhere between a lake and an ocean.
This first time we’re gonna seal in that color.
As soon as this goes in,
we’re gonna allow it to come up to a boil.
And as soon as it comes back up to a boil,
we’re gonna drop it into that basket.
We don’t want to let our vegetables sit in chocking water.
So once they are nice and cold, drain them.
And then as soon as it’s back up to a boil,
we’re gonna drop them back in there.
Let them sit for a minute or two
so that they really can start cooking.
The third blanche is where we’re gonna finish
the last bits of cooking process
and make sure that they’re seasoned correctly.
They’re pretty tender right now, so we’re gonna do it
around the same time we did the second time.
For cooking peas, you could stop at two,
but three is really where they’re gonna pull out
all their sweetness and their sugars
and really show how amazing a frozen pea can be.
And our first vegetable is done.
And now we’re gonna go all in on our asparagus.
This is a super labor-intensive process.
We’re just making vegetables taste good. Look at that.
Second time in,
you’re starting to feel them get a little bit more tender
and beginning that softening process.
And still they are so green still.
And for me, asparagus is like the sign
at the ending of winter.
It’s like a hope in a green vegetable.
They can bend, which means that they are tender and soft.
They still have some texture left to them,
but they’re still bright green.
We’ve had that overcooked, mushy asparagus before,
but I think it’s really time for us to regain our vegetables
and our power back.
Oh, it tastes like spring.
All right, next up, broccoli.
It’s super tasty and delicious.
Most home cooks overcook broccoli.
They don’t add seasoning to it.
Most people are afraid of salt,
but salt actually draws out flavor.
And it’s a super essential ingredient in cooking.
Delicious vegetables take time. And then look at that.
You can smell this. Like that’s how flavorful this is.
And all this is, is water and salt.
That third blanche, you can let it cook a little bit longer.
And the broccoli is still bright green
as if it was from the first one.
Big fan of broccoli.
And broccoli is delicious. It is tender.
It tastes like it straight out of a garden, to be honest.
So this insane electric color comes
from the three times blanching method.
All this is, is salt, water, and thyme.
Vegetables are supposed to be easy,
and I hope we showed you today how easy they can be.
For me, like vegetables and food and cooking is fun.
And what we’ve done here today is pretty amazing.
The through line from all these techniques
that we’ve shown you today is that
we are drawing flavor out of vegetables
that are otherwise thought of as bland or inferior.
Don’t leave your vegetables at the end.
Serve your vegetables throughout your whole meal.
Show them off.
For me, I view vegetables as the star of the show.
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