Fiddlehead Ferns and Italian food.
This week I am visiting the family and we have gotten together a few times to prepare some meals together. This night we decided to make some homemade linguini and pair it with broccoli rabe, fresh tomato, sausage, and a white wine sauce. Unfortunately these are not my dad’s homemade sausages, but my sister and I did make the noodles from scratch. We also cooked up some Fiddlehead Ferns which are currently in season in
This was my first time having the Fiddlehead Ferns and I can now count myself among its fans. They were lightly sautéed in butter with onions, and were still crunchy when we ate them. Apparently there is only a short season for them, and by the time they unfurl they become poisonous and inedible.
The pasta was amazing. I don’t eat a lot of Italian food, but when I do I hope it’s like this. It was very light, just olive oil, wine, vegetables and meats. No heavy red sauce or cheese.
I’ve never tried Fiddlehead Ferns before - what do they taste like? Are they fuzzy? I can’t believe I’ve never had these.
@Steamy Kitchen: I had them two ways last week, the first was at a restaurant and they were very thoroughly cooked and soft. They have a crisp flavor, not bitter. They have lots of nooks for sauce to get into so they took on the flavor of the dish well.
My sister insisted they are best served just lightly cooked, so when we made them in the picture above, we only cooked them for a minute or so, and they were very crunchy. It’s hard for me to describe the how crunchy they were. Imagine if all the little hairs on the ferns were frozen, and each spiny hair was breaking away in your mouth. It’s a little like that. Again, a clean flavor, and were rich, mixing well with the butter they were sautéed in.
I so want to try them! don’t have them here…where did you get them? farmers market or supermkt?
@Steamy Kitchen: To be honest I am completely new to them as well. I had been visiting my sister in Maine all last week, and they seem to be available everywhere! The ones in this picture were from a roadside farmers market, but we saw signs for them at several places. I don’t know all the details, but what I gleaned from my sister was that they are only available for a short period of time in the spring. Possibly as short as a couple of weeks.
You may be able to find them somewhere online if you really want to try them. If not give me an email (it’s in the sidebar ) and perhaps I can have some sent out to you.
I love to read your blog btw
In Seattle I usually find them at the Pike Place Market at one particular stand… only a few people gather them in our region, as far as I can tell, and the season is about 2-3 weeks long. I’ve also spotted them at our local Japanese market.
I made a Japanese style preparation (ohitashi) about five or six weeks ago. See http://blog.jagaimo.com/archive/2007/04/18/warabi-no-ohitashi.aspx
mmm. its saturday morning. I am hungry.
and I say, “Cho-tabetai” I haven’t had Ferns
for long time. It’s usually in 山菜まぜご飯
Sansai maze gohan(literally mountain vegetable mixed
rice) Usually Brackens and other ferns are in it.
Hi John! I just needed to say that Fiddlehead greens are my favorite vegetable. They are really great when lightly steamed and then sprinkled with some lemon. My mom was able to buy them at the Acme near her house in New Jersey. They were not frozen and were in a plastic bag (like a salad bag). I have yet to see them in any Philly Acme, not to my surprise. Maybe they’d be sold in Whole Foods.
Anyway, good luck with the blog! I’m enjoying it. Hopefully Travis and I will see you soon!
@Colleen: Thanks for the comments! You two have to come over for dinner again! I promise i wont break a glass in our dinner right as I am serving it next time! Thank god we had lots of appetizers
[...] the entrée, I had the special: halibut in a green sauce with shrimp, featuring my new favorite, fiddlehead ferns. The other featured entrée (in the off-kilter photo above) was, I believe, salmon with polenta [...]