I
edible season
f you’ve ever been drawn to the baskets filled with leafy greens at the farmers’ market and felt stumped by kale, chard or collards, you’re not alone.
Helping to make sense of it all is the delectable cooking blog A Couple Cooks (ACoupleCooks.com), run by husband and wife Alex and Sonja Overhiser of Indianapolis. The blog, which combines the Overhisers’ healthy, wholesome and mostly vegetarian recipes with their stylish food photos, features an abundance of leafy greens—picture kale frittata, polenta with Swiss chard and garlic, and coconut curry lentils with spinach. The couple begins by shopping at the Indy Winter Farmers’ Market on Saturdays through April at the Indianapolis City Market. For the healthy-cooking bloggers, the farmers’ market is a little bit like what candy stores are to kids: full of surprises to discover. Alongside familiar greens like spinach, kale and chard, they’ve found toraziroh, a tangy Japanese green that cooks just like spinach, and maruba santoh, a mild Chinese cabbage, similar to bok choy—grown by Indiana farmers. “We’re especially fond of Full Hand Farm [of Greenfield] and Homestead Growers [of Sheridan],” Sonja says, “but every grower there has very-high-quality greens.” A Couple Cooks, Alex and Sonja Overhiser, shop for greens at the City Market. Photo by Kelley Jordan Heneveld.
Seeing (and Eating)
Green
Indy food blog A Couple Cooks is inspiration for spring’s leafy greens
Alex recommends that people who are new to greens or looking to shake up their greens routine should seek out leafy varieties in their younger stages, when they’re most likely to be sweet and tender and without the bitter flavor that tends to scare people away from trying new greens altogether. Other than that, Alex and Sonja say selecting greens at the market is a simple matter of making sure they’re not wilted—and if you’re still learning how to distinguish a young, sweet green from an older, spicier one, just ask the vendor for a little taste. “People have become immune to tasting the richer flavors of greens,” Sonja says. “With high-sugar or high-salt foods, you can’t taste the intricacies of flavor.”
BY SARAH SUKSIRI
10
edible indy
Spring 2013
