Remember when Euell Gibbons made the Johnny Carson show just by claiming, har-har, that dandelions were edible? What a goof he was!
Well, guess what. My local supermarket has had big stacks of dandelion greens in stock all winter. Truly, nothing is too weird to show up in the American produce department these days.
When I started cooking-shortly after the introduction of gas stoves, it now seems-it was quite an event to be able to find red bell peppers. Each summer, I'd order a case from my friendly grocer, roast and peel them in one blazing backyard briquette orgy and then freeze them to last the rest of the year.
Just this winter-and not including farmers markets-I have seen cavolo nero (a kind of Tuscan kale), fresh black-eyed peas, lotus root, puntarella (a deliciously bitter vegetable, something like celery), pummelos, Jerusalem artichokes and Brussels sprouts on the stalk. Oh yes, we've had red bell peppers too-completely out of season.
My local market, which seems to cater to black and Hispanic clienteles (I can get both fresh masa and virtually every smoked pork product known to man), has always carried a good assortment of greens: kale, collard, mustard, Texas mustard (paradoxically, it's somewhat frillier and more delicate). But this winter, dandelions joined the mix.
They look just like the ones you find in your yard, provided you have very rich soil and haven't mowed since, say, the Carter administration. The leaves are roughly eight to 10 inches long, andslender, with the familiar sharply serrated "toothy" pattern on the leaves (our word dandelion comes from dent de lion, French for "tooth of the lion'). They're a dark, vivid green and seem to hold up remarkably well in storage. After a full winter of buying them, I have yet to see wilted tops. I've learned to check the bottoms of the stems-that's where they seem to begin to fall apart.
I cook them the same way I cook any other bitter green. They're best either with big, forceful flavors, like garlic or anchovies, or played against bland things, like pasta or toasted bread bruschetta. Or with a bean soup, like this one.
Bean soups are a staple of my cooking this time of year. They're hearty and full of the kind of earthy flavor that seems perfect when the weather is gray and clammy. They are also almost infinitely adaptable. As with this recipe, you can make bean soup with ham or some other smoky pig part (hocks are particularly good; include a whole one while the soup is cooking, then retrieve it and shred the meat, being sure to include a little of the fatty skin when you add it back to the pot). Or you can make it vegetarian with an olive oil base.
