Mustard Greens

This weeks new thing is mustard greens. Being a southern boy, I had greens available a lot, but I didn't enjoy them. I was very picky when I was young (still am a little), but something about them didn't seem appetizing. Perhaps it was that they were overcooked, perhaps it was all the other stuff added, perhaps it was the bitter taste. But it was time to give them another try.

Now I made a mistake here. Things were not in proportion when I cooked. I'll give what I think should be the correct recipe, but I used only 1 bunch of greens, so there was way too much sausage for the greens.

Mustard Greens
1 link of sausage, diced relatively small, or a couple of strips of bacon, diced
2 large or 3 medium cloves of garlic, minced
red chili flakes to taste
3 bunches of mustard greens, washed, prep follows
1/4 cup diced onion
pepper to taste
splash of vinegar (white, rice, cider, whatever you have handy)
sprinkle of sugar
salt if needed (my sausage had plenty)
1-2T olive oil

Take the mustard greens and remove bad leaves. Trim off the hard stem sections (with little or minimal leaf area). Wash and stack the leaves.. make sure to have a large one on the bottom.. you may need to do this in batches. Roll up the leaves and with a sharp knife cut into ~1 inch strips, across the stem of the leaf. Set aside.

In a large frying pan, heat the olive oil and add the sausage. Once it begins to brown, add the garlic and red chili flakes. Cook briefly being careful not to burn the garlic.

Add a handful of the greens, allow them to wilt, tossing with the garlic and sausage. Once partly wilted, add more greens, making sure you can still toss them without them spilling everywhere. Repeat until all the greens are added. Once wilted, add a splash of vinegar and sugar, salt, and pepper to taste. If the greens are still not completely cooked, add a little water and cook until the water cooks off.

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Like I mentioned earlier, I used only one bunch of greens, so some of my bites were mostly sausage with only a tiny bit of greens.. good, but not what I was after. :)