There’s a bumper crop of new enthusiasm for vegetables this spring. Cookbook authors, cooks and culinary trend spotters are placing vegetables in the spotlight.
Coal-roasted beets with charred onions and red mustard frills topped with crispy chicken skins prepared by chef Ashley Christensen of Poole’s Diner in Raleigh charmed food savvy guests gathered for a luncheon at Bacchanalia to kick off the 2015 High Museum Atlanta Wine Auction.
Miller Union chef Steven Satterfield’s new cookbook “Root to Leaf: A Southern Chef Cooks Through the Seasons” celebrates produce-proud cuisine with such recipes as Shrimp and Fava Beans, and Spinach and Strawberry Salad. The watermelon radishes and broccoli casserole garnered as much (well, almost as much) attention as the fried chicken from food writers gathered to get a sneak peek of culinary highlights of the May 29-June 1 Atlanta Food & Wine Festival.
Not just for vegetarians
Internationally renowned chef Jose Andres, famous for his ground-breaking creativity with Spanish cuisine in tapas restaurants from Washington D.C. to Las Vegas has turned more of his attention to what springs from the ground. His new fast casual dining concept, Beefsteak, features a garden variety of chef-prepared vegetables topped with the protein of your choice and a selection of sauces. “This is not a salad bar. This is not vegetarian. This is not vegan,” said Andres during his keynote address at the International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) conference this past weekend. Andres says Beefsteak’s early success shows that people do want to eat their vegetables if they’re prepared in a delicious way. “I cried the first day we opened because the lines were so long.”
They can even be a hit at parties. Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough’s “Vegetarian Dinner Parties” won the IACP People’s Choice Cookbook Award.
Always a hit with the nutrition community, vegetables were center stage at the recent American Society for Nutrition (ASN) conference. Research confirms that repeated exposure to vegetables helps increase acceptance in children. “It appears that many children need to try a new food eight to 12 times in order to learn to like it, while parents often give up after three to five tries if the food is rejected,” said Susan Johnson, Ph.D., professor of pediatrics and director of the Children’s Eating Laboratory at University of Colorado-Denver.
Meanwhile, the sad state of veggie affairs shows more than 90 percent of children fail to meet vegetable recommendations, and these patterns often persist into adulthood.
Calling all chefs and cookbook authors to the rescue!
