Sliced Brussels Sprouts with Brown Butter

I always struggle with Brussels sprouts. I’ve tried all different ways of cooking them – roasting, pan searing, even braising them with bacon. None of them did it for me. They always had that “funky” taste and sometimes came out mushy. I’ve heard different theories on causes of the funky taste. Number one reason could be overcooking (admittedly, that blame lies with the cook). Another theory proposed that the tiny core of each sprout was to blame. One recommended solution was to pull off all the outer leaves, one by one, and discard the core. I actually tried it – and it did work – but boy was it a pain in the you-know-what. Then I tried a new approach: slicing the sprouts very thin. The resulting pieces cooked up very quickly, thus solving the overcooking, mushy problem (and it’s a lot faster than pulling off the leaves one at a time). And because you have to grip on to the stem of each sprout in order to slice it, you end up discarding the core. When all is said and done, you’re left with crisp, buttery Brussels sprouts without a lot of prep time in the kitchen.

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Sliced Brussels Sprouts with Brown Butter

Brussels Sprouts and M&Ms

When I was a kid, my parent’s told us that every once in a while, you might find an M&M inside of a brussels sprout. The only way to find one, of course, was to eat all of your brussels sprouts. Now I know what you’re thinking – didn’t you catch on after a while when these elusive candies never appeared? Ah, but my parents were tricky. Just often enough to keep us hooked, they would slip an M&M on to our plate and exclaim “Look! One of them must have fallen out!”. I eventually wised up and caught on to their scheme, but I never really cared for brussels sprouts – as a kid or an adult, candy or no candy.

Then last year, a stalk of them arrives in our Angelic Organics box. First off – a stalk?!? I honestly never knew how they grew; it was a revelation. My next thought – brussels sprouts, great... what am I going to do with these? But, I did some research and experimenting and found out that I actually really like them when they’re roasted. They become a completely different beast – sweet and caramely without a hint of the funk that the raw (or for that matter, canned) ones have.

When I saw these at the Green City Farmer’s market today, I couldn’t pass them up. Iron Creek Farms was also selling them in convenient pints, already cleaned and off the stalk – but what fun would that be? Now is the time to enjoy them while they’re in season. Of course you can find them all year round in the grocery store, but they don’t look like this!