My mother used to make a casserole out of artichoke bottoms, breast of turkey, and cream of (celery? mushroom? ???) soup. Easy, and went well on nice occasions.
I want to make it for tomorrow night, but for more sophisticated tastebuds. What would make it good for today’s palates?
That sounds really, really tasty. Top it off with some grated parmesan, maybe (not Kraft)?
Reggiano Parmesano. That stuff rocks.
On IM with The Sausage Creature , we both thought that you could do it with smoked turkey and prosciutto. Whaddya think?
You guys rock!
Tell me how it goes, I’d try it but my oven no worky.
TSC, the Casserole (oh, who am I kidding? All food is game.) Fiend.
Artichokes get along very, very well with these things:
Olive oil
Garlic
Rosemary
Thyme
Lemon (juice or zest)
Parmesan
What kind of artichoke bottoms are you using? I.e., fresh, canned, frozen, marinated?
They are fresh. I have a big bag of small artichokes, & I’m cutting off the leaves down to the point where you can eat everything that’s left with a knife and fork. I’ll throw them into lemony water as I go to stop them from oxydizing while I work.
I recently made Lemon Braised Artichokes from Michael Chiarello’s website. It’s not quite a casserole, but it’s the best artichoke recipe I’ve ever tried.
I swear, everything I make from this man’s site has turned out fantastic, and in addition, he’s extremely hot. I love his cooking show, too. Hot men that can cook get me where I live.
He looks good, but he’s a tad feminine, don’t you think? I keep picturing him saying something like “Chop 1 onion… oh my god! Girlfriend, yellow is NOT your color! and mix it with the tomatoes…”
I’m cookin’ up a move to Cafe Society.
Do you open them up and remove the choke before cooking?
I thought you were supposed to remove the choke after it’s cooked. How do you do it before? Everything is so darned locked up before it’s soft.
Throw some capers in to that artichoke thang. Just a few. They’re weird if you overdo it.
They are tough to clean before cooking. However, a sharp knife and a determined will can do it. It’s essential in many recipes to trim up a raw artichoke and then proceed with cooking. Here’s one way of trimming them, particularly the smaller ones that our OP contemplates. The big, California globe chokes I like to quarter after the trimming and nip out the choke with a paring knife.