Eat Your Sprouts
On Brussels sprouts, one of the great culinary roadblocks between childhood and adulthood
How many of you like Brussels sprouts? Okay, that’s a nice show of hands. Brussels sprouts are a tasty addition to any meal. Now, how many of you liked Brussels sprouts as a child? I see a few hands still up in the air, hands belonging to LIARS. Sprouts are in no way, shape, or form a food that children generally grow up eating because they like them. Okay, maybe I’m being a little too harsh or generalizing. There’s always one kid who eats stuff that other kids don’t, and I’m not talking about paste either. However, a child’s palate isn’t really built to appreciate bitter flavors or stuff like umami. There’s a reason why many vegetables and fungi are called “acquired tastes.” Sprouts are perhaps the mascot food of this phenomenon, because it feels, anecdotally of course, that more adults refuse to try those mini-cabbages than they do mushrooms, asparagus, broccoli, or any other food that “you appreciate more as an adult.” There’s no reason not to try them.
Admittedly, the sprout has an uphill climb to overcome its reputation. As it is looks like a petite version of the cabbage, it does not have just a little bit of that strong, cabbage flavor. Oh no. Think of it like a chicken bouillon cube or a packet of Kool-Aid drink mix. A sprout is cabbage concentrate. Unlike the cube or the drink pack, it is not meant to be diluted. It is the very definition of a bold flavor. Because that taste happens to be bitter rather than sweet or salty, it’s understandable why kids don’t flock to it. It’s not medicinal-tasting by any stretch of the imagination, but a child’s brain works on simple, synaptic connections. Bitter is bad, and they’re not going to meet you in the middle on it because that’s not how their worldview operates. It’s fine; it’s something that can be overcome with teaching and guidance over the years.
Granted, too much of anything is bad, be it bitter, salty, sweet, or spicy. The reason why so many people still keep their barriers up on sprouts is that preparation is often lacking. You can’t just boil these bad boys like you can asparagus or string beans and expect to get some reasonable facsimile of something edible. In fact, you shouldn’t just boil asparagus or string beans either. But you can get away with that preparation as long as you know how to use salt, pepper, and butter. I’m not sure that simplistic hand is going to work for the hardy sprout. Cooking is about balance, and bitter flavors, appreciated not by those with virgin palates but by those who’ve seen a few things, experienced a life of soul-uplifting highs and heartbreaking lows, are but one wistful color on the palette of the kitchen. You have to use it in harmony with other flavors, other tones. I have a few good ideas to share with you.
Roasting – Simple yet elegant, roasting sprouts might not seem like a step up from boil or steam-in-bag and plop in a bowl applications. The difference is that roasting anything, the application of direct, dry heat rather than a bath in a hot, flavorless liquid, does more to develop flavors. It adds some char and starts chemical reactions that develop and deepen flavors within the thing being roasted. All one needs is contained in four ingredients outside of the sprouts themselves: salt, pepper, garlic, olive oil. Defter cooks with wider palates can experiment with other additions, but you just need some seasoning and a good fat to do the work. I recommend cutting the sprouts in half first for a shorter cook time and an easier bite. The ideal temperature if you’re using an oven is 400°F at 40 minutes. You can play with temps and times to get different textures as long as you don’t scorch the shit out of them in the process. Either way though, this is the easy way to get your foot in the door on sprouts if you’ve been living in the past on them and want to give them another chance.
Sautéing – Bacon has been ruined by hucksters online who think excess is personality. I personally blame The Chive for creating a backlash against the cured pork belly product. As with most good things that morons on the Internet ruin, bacon is still one of the best, most flavorful ingredients one can use, not just on its own, but as a companion for something else. It’s not just great for its meat, but the fat that renders out of each rasher is a fat that doesn’t need to be compounded or infused in order to impart flavor into its subject. In fact, the enterprising cook would be wise to save that rendered fat and store it for future use. Just a helpful hint from ya boy TH.
Anyway, bacon and Brussels sprouts are one of those food combinations that just make sense. Bacon fat provides the right kind of luxurious unction with a salty, smoky, and subtly sweet back that mellows out the bitterness of the sprout and allows it to come out of its shell to play on your tongue. Roasting is more of an exact science than sauteing is, so I don’t really have a hard and fast time for you to put those bad boys in the pan together. Cooking is one of those places where art and science meet, and you have to have a knack for which one is applicable in what situation. Personally, I like to keep anything I sauté on the stovetop at a medium heat. Still, you keep a watch over it until the sprouts are nice and tender.
Sauces – The best way to impart flavor to something, anything, is to use a sauce. What sauces pair well with sprouts, though? One common one I’ve seen is the balsamic glaze, which makes a ton of sense. Balsamic vinegar reduced down into a sticky sweet slather provides a worthy counterweight. What other sauces can play well with the sprout’s inherent flavors? One intriguing option that I had with dinner the other night was a Korean-inspired sauce. Korean food incorporates a lot of earthy, fermented flavors. Not surprisingly, the sauce, which tasted like it had a gochujang base, was another perfect dance partner for the sprouts. I’ve also seen hollandaise sauce, barbecue sauce, bang bang sauce, and even cheese sauces in scalloped and macaroni-and-cheese applications. Basically, you want to look for extreme pulls in opposite directions from the bitterness of the sprouts. You want something sweet or acidic or earthy or creamy. Big flavors need other big flavors to pop.
No matter how you slice them, Brussels sprouts are a vegetable that you should give a second chance. Forget everything you know about them from when your parents made you eat them as a kid. I can’t guarantee you’ll like them, but maybe you’ll be surprised at how much your palate has changed or grown over the years. If you do enjoy them, they’ll be a go-to side for you for any kind of main dish, be it steak or chicken or whatever it is you’re in the mood for. In short, eat your sprouts.
Photo via Delish.com