Artichokes cooked in Olive Oil

To go with my Branzino I decided to make something from the much neglected side dish chapter. Considering that any of the recipes would go perfect with the fish, I went with some baby artichokes from my local Whole Foods Market. 

Many chefs, in an attempt to keep their diners interest and attention put lots of different components on the plate. Batali has a good thing going at Babbo by offering an array of side dishes, allowing the diner to be the director of the meal. This way, one can have several different plates with out over stuffing themselves and each plate has just what it needs. 

Much of the the recipes here come from the local farmers market and so should ours. 

My backup camera crew (i.e. my wife) was busy dress shopping so I wasn't able to get too many action shots of the artichoke preparation. Artichokes brown super fast so I wasted no time in prepping them. There is a great video from Mario on his YouTube channel which goes into detail about how to prepare the artichokes for cooking. The link for the video is here:

 http://youtu.be/pXfbWptoLmE

Once the artichokes were trimmed and quartered, I put them in a saucepan and added oil, mint, red pepper flakes, and garlic. The pan is brought up to a boil. Once boiling, the artichokes are taken off the heat to cool for about 15 minutes. 

The artichokes just need to be seasoned and they are ready for eating. 

The artichokes were just cooked through. The mint and garlic really come through on the palette with just a hint of spice. The leftover oil can be saved to make a very flavorful vinaigrette. Artichokes aren't my favorite vegetable, but I enjoyed the way Mario had me prepare them. 

Next up I make some more fish. Or maybe pasta. Oh god I don't know, there are so many good options in this store. Until next time...