Buffooned Over Cardoons

They may look like celery, but cardoons certainly aren't as crisp and delightful.

Next time I try to tackle a cardoon, I will be armed with a vegetable peeler to scrape away at every sinew and fiber.

Cardoons are like overgrown celery. Try treating them as such and you realize that cardoons prove very different. In fact, they are thistles, much like artichokes, daisies and sunflowers, according to the most authoritative sources. I surfed around and found nothing but accolades for this thistle.

I also found that I only needed to blanch cardoons for up to 20 minutes. The CSA flyer suggested anywhere from five to 20 minutes. Well, which is it? So, I decided to blanch them while checking on the tenderness every five minutes. After 20 minutes, the one-inch slices were still tough, fibrous and bland. No wonder its traditional preparation is a gratin. Everything tastes better with cheese.

But tossed into pasta? No, not gonna happen. Time to take the CSA’s recipes with a grain of salt.

The cardoons went straight into the food processor. Pureed and mixed into soup would be the only way I could benefit from the fiber, this vegetables only redeeming factor, as far as I’m concerned.

I’ll never forget what the nun at the soup kitchen once explained during a fourth grade fieldtrip: “Anything goes in a stew”. That certainly held true with cardoons. As a puree, its presence in soup was virtually undetectable, except for the gritty texture. Add quinoa, and the cover up is complete.