Braised Belgian Endive -- #recipe by @LeslieBudewitz

LESLIE BUDEWITZ: When Mr. Right was a boy, the mother of one of his friends loved to serve Belgian endive. It was a curious vegetable, one he didn’t have at home, even though his mother was an excellent cook. But how to pronounce it? ON-deev, with a French accent, which the neighbor preferred, or EN-dive, a more American sound? 

No matter how you say it, it’s tasty, one of the milder of the “bitter greens,” such as kale, chicory, curly endive, and radicchio. The scoop-shaped leaves are sometimes stuffed with other foods, or served in a salad, with radicchio, oranges or grapefruit, cranberries or pomegranate seeds, and a light vinaigrette.

When we were grocery shopping and spotted a particularly beautiful display of endive, we brought a few home. I created this braised version to add an Asian flavor and served it with Longevity Noodles for the New Year. (You’ll find that recipe in Between a Wok and a Dead Place, the 7th Spice Shop mystery coming this summer, and I’ll share it then.) It would also be great with Cold Sesame Noodles, fried rice, or any other dish with Asian-inspired flavors.

So if your New Year’s resolutions include eating more vegetables, try this one! No matter how you pronounce it!

Braised Belgian Endive

6 medium Belgian endives

1 cup water

3 tablespoons sesame oil

2 teaspoons kosher salt

2 teaspoons sugar

1 teaspoon rice wine vinegar

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Prepare the endives: Cut off the root end. Strip the outer leaves, then cut each endive in half and rinse, carefully separating the layers as you would washing a leek. Cut each half again, giving you quarters. If some of the leaves separate and fall off, no worries! 

In a large frying pan, combine all ingredients except the endive. Bring to a low boil and reduce heat to a simmer.

Add the endive to the pan in a single layer. Cook, turning occasionally, about 8-10 minutes. The hearts or cores should be tender to a knife. 

Raise heat and cook, again turning the vegetables occasionally, until the liquid has mostly evaporated and the endive have begun to turn golden at the edges, about 5-6 minutes.

Serves 4.  

What new recipes or foods are you looking forward to trying this year?

From the cover of BLIND FAITH, written as Alicia Beckman (in hardcover, ebook, and audio from Crooked Lane Books, October 2022)  

Long-buried secrets come back with a vengeance in a cold case gone red-hot in Agatha Award-winning author Alicia Beckman’s second novel, perfect for fans of Laura Lippman and Greer Hendricks.

Two women whose paths crossed in Montana years ago discover they share keys to a deadly secret that exposes a killer—and changes everything they thought they knew about themselves. 

Leslie Budewitz is the author of the Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries and the Spice Shop Mysteries, continuing in July 2022 with Peppermint Barked. She's the winner of Agatha Awards in three categories. Death al Dente, the first Food Lovers' Village Mystery, won Best First Novel in 2013, following her 2011 win in Best Nonfiction. Her first historical short story, "All God's Sparrows," won the 2018 Agatha Award for Best Short Story. As Alicia Beckman, she writes standalone suspense, beginning with Bitterroot Lake (2021) and continuing with Blind Faith (October 2022, Crooked Lane Books).

A past president of Sisters in Crime and a current board member of Mystery Writers of America, she lives in northwest Montana with her husband, a musician and doctor of natural medicine, and their cat, an avid bird-watcher.

Swing by her website and subscribe to her seasonal newsletter, for a chat about the writing life, what she's working on, and  what she's reading -- and a free short story. And join her on Facebook where she shares book news and giveaways from her writer friends, and talks about food, mysteries, and the things that inspire her.