How would you cook this?

This morning at the Farmer's Market, I picked up a bag of an interesting mix of "thinnings" from a young lady who is an author, and teacher. Her speciality is wild food field guides. Her mix includes pea shoots, baby beet greens, baby kale, cilantro, dandelion, vitamin greens (?) broccoli raab. A note on the label says, "traditionally roasted along with meats or root vegetables, this braising mix is also great in stir-fries, quiches and casseroles, adventurous salads or juice!"
I'm thinking of stir-frying them for lunch in EVOO, with some fresh garlic. I think this might be good in an omelette. Or maybe I could put them into some hot chicken broth and add some gnocchi. What might you do with such a mix?

Fry up some pancetta or a little Italian sausage, saute the greens in the fat with some garlic and a little EVOO, and either toss with pasta or put on top of polenta?

That's how most of our greens are consumed.

Oh boy! Sounds like the mother lode. I'd love a mix like that.

I like the idea of the fresh garlic and olive oil. I'd add some crushed red pepper flakes, and then put the cooked greens inside pizza dough.

Fried greens calzone!

stir fry jumped out to me as well, though good to see some alternative ideas.

traditionally roasted

Interesting. I've never heard of roasting greens.

I'm also one for sauteeing or stir-frying.

In addition, depending how tender they are, they can be great last-minute additions to soups, wilting/cooking just from the last minute heat.

I eat a lot of greens. But, today was the first time I saw fava greens at the market.

[Jenise]

Interesting. I've never heard of roasting greens.

They're popular up here. The local Co-op always has big bowls of salad greens and braising greens side by side in the fresh local greens section. The latter favors mixtures of kales, chards and other good stuff.

[Robin Garr]

They're popular up here.

Mary just got a big bag at the farmers' market today - looks like broccoli rabe and kale and ... some other stuff. She's planning to saute them in olive oil with lots of garlic and a little red-pepper flake.

They're popular up here. The local Co-op always has big bowls of salad greens and braising greens side by side in the fresh local greens section. The latter favors mixtures of kales, chards and other good stuff.

Yes, but for roasting? I.E. for putting in the oven?

Or is there another definition of roasting that I'm not familiar with?

[Jenise]

They're popular up here. The local Co-op always has big bowls of salad greens and braising greens side by side in the fresh local greens section. The latter favors mixtures of kales, chards and other good stuff.

Yes, but for roasting? I.E. for putting in the oven?

Sure. I realize that braising and roasting aren't the same technique, but I've talked to the growers here and I know they consider the words interchangeable: long-cooked greens either simmered in a bit of broth or cooked along with roasted meats.

I wondered about the roasting/braising method with tender baby leaves, as well. So for lunch I did a stir-fry with EVOO, roasted garlic and red pepper flakes. Some of the leaves were getting really brown, so I added a bit of chicken broth, covered and cooked on low. They were delicious, except for one thing. There were some stems in there that I found really chewy, and stringy. Not sure which but I suspect the pea shoots, as they were rather mature and not pea shoots at all, but the vine part of the pea plant. Lots of leaves and very long. I actually had to chop them into manageable bites before cooking. I saved half the bag and tomorrow I will have the rest for lunch, but I am going to inspect more carefully and see what the chewy part was. These were so clean, and fresh.....I did not notice the stems might be tough. Thanks for all the suggestions. I love the opening of the market because we do get all the "thinnings" and all the leafy things are fabulous. I got some baby beet greens today with tiny beets on the ends. Farmer lady said they thinned the beets last night. Oh yum!

Thai Jungle Curry. See Victor Sodsook's "True Thai" cookbook.

-Paul W.