Veg stalks do you bin or use?

[Mr Gus]

Going back to the Broccoli I mentioned elsewhere, I have given the dogs the stalk (which they relish & devour) however watching a chef on youtube (the butter guy) he recommends using it all, having cut the nodules out & then thin cut slices on it & bunging it in to blanche with the rest...

Old habits die hard, sometimes rational, practical thinking escapes us (taught on the knee type thing) any other vegs I ought be paying similar attention to bits that normally get binned!?

Having picked up 2 head of broccoli i'm due to give it a bash, being a non peeler of potatoes (all that texture & vitamins) it's going to be a tool drawer search with a bit of mardy language thrown in I guess (kiddo probably purloined it for plymouth digs) a mix of thin slice cuts & thick peelings ...would be nice to include some broccoli with my morning rice maybe (mackerel prices have soared, & rare-er again as a species, so another one I have to pare back on.

[Bugtownboy]

Stalks, leaves etc of Broccoli, Cauliflower and other similar veg are good as they are as a ‘veg’ or finely sliced in stir fry or, what we tend to do, is hang onto them then make a soup.

You’ve bought it, don’t throw it away.

[Mr Gus]

Yeah, that's it, everything I know is self taught, Aga cooking as a kid didn't involve much of what I do now, tbh until the other day one of my "fears" aside from a mandolin (tip / chunk of finger gone thanks to distraction) was the fried egg, mine were duff (likely from aga days & avoidance of oil AND NOT EATING WHITES till a few years ago) ..so I made myself do fried egg on toast several days on the trot with far more oil than I'd normally use & got over the hump with a fast clean fry, that hang up still sticks to my frying pan use which has always been a rarity, so that ran over even onto my sous vide steaks to some degree, tonight I applied the same technique to our rump peppered steaks for flash after sous & way pinker, ..no butter involved just the left over egg oil.

less than 30 seconds per steak total, nice char, cooked so differently to butter in a little sunflower oil (much to my disgust)

Never stop learning eh!?

Maybe use my truffle oil next

I tried to get over my hatred of cauliflower cheese a few weeks ago, some nightmares don't change even when you use good ingredients, had me gagging then heaving over my own cooking, sprouts I can finally handle, cauliflower it seems ...not even if I live to be 100.

[Bugtownboy]

Roast the cauli with some Middle Eastern/North African spice - Ras-al-Hanout, Baharat etc.

Total game changer.

Try roasting kale - oh my !

[Mr Gus]

Roast kale I like, only one who does it, they'll eat it then but never do it themselves.
!
Same with a ruddy banana split "but you do it so much better" ... (no, just evenly pieced & layered) ..it's a conspiracy

[Bugtownboy]

On the subject of food ‘waste’, Gus, have you tried cooking banana skins ?

I was of the ‘you’re having a larf’ view, so tried it.

I think there are two main options - Banana skin bacon, which I haven’t tried, or Banana skin pulled pork, which I did.

Think there are probably loads of recipes out there - I cut the BS into 2-3” chunks, fried with garlic, chilli, southern spices, maybe adding a bit of water to loosen at the end.

Shred the cooked BS and eat - good on a roll as a pulled pork sandwich.

It was ok - flavour coming from all the spicing, texture from the BS.

We don’t eat enough Bananas to do this regularly - if you do, it’s another option to reduce waste.

(I realise using BS as an abbreviation isn’t the best, but it honestly was to avoid writing Banana Skin each time - perhaps I should have termed it peel Also, don’t think it’s anything like the 70’s hype of smoking dried banana skins to get a high - don’t think that works.

Nutmeg, on the other hand )

[Mr Gus]

That BS malarkey is definitely peculiar sounding.
Presumably smaller organic skins needed?

(banana plantations being notorious for toxic overspraying that causes all sorts of problems)

(glyphosate also linked into accelerated? soil erosion) ..with chem-soup swilling around the shores of the likes of martinique...

Tread carefully regarding outer skin contaminants

https://cen.acs.org/environment/persist ... nned/99/i7

I'll take a look at what the fry oil is & make a note.

[Bugtownboy]

I think it highlights that there are food sources we don’t utilise - I’m still not convinced by the BD thing. Doesn’t fit with our tastes.

And we only occasionally have Bananas.

Things like Broccoli and Cauli stalks and leaves are a biggy in terms of waste.

As said previously, we tend to use them mostly in soups as it gives an alternate meal.

We were surprised last year with Turnip tops - make an amazing veg dish - Friarielli. Probably better than the Turnip, though these are best roasted.

Allegedly you can use Radish tops in the same way - didn’t seem as good when we tried.

Also, Carrot and Beetroot leaves in salad - best if you use home grown, though.