Saturday, May 28, 2011

What the $%^ are fiddleheads?

You see them in the grocery store (heck, you may see them on your morning jog) a few weeks in spring.  Strange, curled green things, almost catepillar like, sitting in a big pile in the produce section.  Then they vanish, not to be seen again until the following year.  What are they?

Fiddlehead ferns are simply ferns that have not unrolled into their full ferny glory.  There are a handful of species that are edible (most common: Bracken, although Ostrich are more widely available in my neck of the New England Woods), and have been part of few major culinary traditions (Native American, then hence later on New England's, and Asian).  They pop up and quickly over a few weeks turn into the less edible ferns you see during your nature hike.  They are not farmed, but foraged.  Yes, even the ones you find at Whole Foods.

This leads to a particular quandry.  Although growing up on the forest floor near a burbling brook might sound idylic (Figure 1.aa), what it actually makes these is an amusement park for microbes, which  in turn will use your GI tract as a roller-coaster ride.  Fiddleheads should be washed and cooked thoroughly by all but the bravest of gastronomes.  The University of Maine suggests boiling for 10 minutes or steaming for 20, which might be a little much for those of us who want to taste some of the more delicate flavors of these little guys, but not a bad idea if you're foraging them on your own.  Today's foraging spot was yesterday's deer bathroom.

(Figure 1.aa:  The original Avatar.  The whole place was crawling with Giardia.)

So what do we actually do with fiddleheads in the kitchen once we've Bear Grylls'd them out of the woods (or Trader Joe's), other then boil the fun out of them?  They have a spinach-y flavor, and a nice crunch, so I treat them like I do the myriad of greens I get in my CSA box:  Sautee.

Sauteed Fiddlehead Ferns
  • One pound of fiddlehead ferns, generously rinsed.  This is not a recipe to try if your town is on a water ban.  Hose those ameoba down the drain!
  • About a tablespoon of unsalted butter
  • A big splash of white wine.  I used a reisling to balance out the other flavors in the dish.
  • Salt.  When I made this recipe, I decided to uber-Spring it up with some weird coarse-salt-and-dried-flowers mixture made by these people.  The attending from the last post brought over the other day in exchange for the notary services of my girlfriend.  Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.
Melt the butter in a large sautee pan over medium-high heat.  When it's smoky-hot and almost turning brown, toss in the fiddleheads and let them cook until they're smoky hot and almost turning brown (about 10-15 minutes).  See that light brown patina on the bottom of the pan?  That's pure carmelized flavor, and you're going to harness it with a technique called deglazing.  Right before you think your ferns are ready, throw that splash of wine into the pan and aggressively scrape at that brown stuff with a WOODEN SPOON ONLY.  Do not scrape with a metal spoon, unless you like shrapnel.  Rubber spatulas are not stiff enough to stand up to the task.  Only a wooden spoon will do.  Toss the fiddleheads around in the pan a bit to coat them in your brand-new pan-sauce.  Season with whatever messed up salt you have knocking around in your pantry and serve (Figure 1.ab).

(Figure 1.ab - Fiddleheads make for a great dinner on the balcony.)

Now get off you're computer and go find these things!  You probably only have another week or so before they're gone.

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