A Brooklyn Girl’s Guide To Sunday: How To Actually Like Your Greens

Everyone talks about greens pretty obsessively, and it gets even more intense in the summer, when kale, spinach, and chard of all types are in season. As a full-time veggie lover, I’ve always struggled with greens. I know that they’re basically earth-grown vitamin pills that are life-changing and make your skin glow, they’re full of fiber, etc etc, but I actually have found that there are few things I like less than straight lettuce, that salad is my best and worst frenemy, and that I do not like uncooked kale, no matter how much massaging its undergone. Spinach is an exception for me; I love spinach cooked, uncooked, steamed, and stewed. But the other greens, the tougher ones, the ones that are really deep in that superfood category, have always been a little bit of a problem.

Here’s my go-to strategy for cooking greens so that eating them won’t feel like a chore– whether that’s kale, dandelion, chard, whatever it may be— from the ground to the farmers market and into my stomach: I take an entire glove of garlic– fresh if possible but anything will work– and I chop it up into little tiny pieces. The professionals would probably call this dicing. I add in as many chopped tiny onions or scallions or shallots as I have; the more onions, the better. Squeeze a bunch of lemon over the whole thing, put everything in a pan, pour in at least one cup of water, sprinkle it with salt so that it all breaks down a little faster, and also because salt— enough said. Stir them around until the mix is cooked and starting to caramelize a little bit; it’ll all cook down quite a bit. Add your washed chopped veggies– as long as the pieces are relatively small you’re good to go– and cook them in the same pan, depending on how cooked you like your greens. They’ll be garlicky, onion-y, lemon-y and really, really good.