Ilse's Kitchen - culinary adventures of a girl who loves to eat

I had a big bunch of cavolo nero, and a bit of searching for some ideas on what to do with it brought me to the UK edition of Delicious Magazine, where I found a recipe of which this one is an almost exact copy. Delicious took me back, back in time - all the way back to 2007 when I followed my first basic cooking course from Wiljan Koopmans @ Kookschool Delicious in Amsterdam. Ingredients (serves 2): 200g dried chickpeas, soaked overnight in ample cold water 60g olive oil 40g diced pancetta or bacon 1 small onion, finely chopped 1 celery stalk, chopped 2 garlic cloves, minced 500mL chicken stock 1 sprig fresh oregano 140g cavolo nero, roughly chopped 1 tsp lemon juice pinch of chili flakes salt and freshly ground black pepper garnish with grated parmesan and sour cream Instructions: 1. Place the chickpeas in a large pan of cold water. Salt the water and bring to a simmer. Simmer for 20-30 minutes, until the chick peas are tender. Drain and set aside. 2. In a fr...

It’s Saturday, and it feels like a real Saturday. No ‘have-tos’, just loads and loads of time for myself. Sleeping in, wearing my pj’s half of the day, Netflix and comfort food. Starting off with this twist on an Ottolenghi recipe to satisfy my weekend brunch craving.  Ingredients (serves 1): 2/3 leek, chopped into 1/2 cm rings 70g kale (I used the cavolo nero variety), chopped 40g feta, broken into smallish (1 cm) pieces 1 tbsp lemon (I quartered my lemon and used about half of the quarter), pips removed & chopped, including the rind and skin) 2 large eggs 100mL vegetable stock dash of cumin powder 1 teaspoon za’atar 1 tbsp butter 2 tbsp olive oil  salt and freshly ground black pepper Instructions:  1. Put the butter and half of the olive oil in a small skillet that you can cover with a lid. Melt the butter and when it starts to bubble, add the leek. Season lightly with salt, then sauté for a few minutes until the leek softens....

For a while, I ordered vegetable delivery crates filled with seasonal veggies. By way of the crate I discovered cavolo nero... if it hadn't been chosen for me, I might never have given it a second look. And that would have been too bad, because then I would never have learned about all the wonderful things you can do with it. Cavolo nero (black kale, Tuscan cabbage, or palmkool in Dutch) is an Italian cabbage with dark soft leaves. Instead of growing in heads like some other cabbage types, its leaves grow straight up like fronds... and it is, it turns out, a beloved ingredient in minestrone soups, Tuscan risotto, pasta, and even lentil dishes. I put it to the test with the first best thing I had in the pantry: some carnaroli rice. The cavolo nero passed the test with flying colours.