How to Saute Greens

Featured Pro: Sam Talbot
Category: Cooking
Time: 2:49


SAM TALBOT: When it comes to dinner, choosing your side-dish selections can be so boring, tiresome, or, even worse, redundant. Personally, I’m a big fan of big leafy greens that I get at the market. I’m going to show you some cool tips on how to prepare them too.

I’m Sam Talbot, and this is your GMC Trade Secret.

So today we’re talking greens, glorious greens. There’s everything under the sun. I’m sure you know about spinach. You probably know how to saute it. But there’s kale. There’s collards. There’s Swiss chard. Then, of course, there’s one of my favorites, rainbow chard.

If you’ve never seen this stuff, don’t worry. It’s really easy to do. All you do is take the whole stem, cut off the leaves. We’ll set the stems aside. We’re going to take this, these nice big leaves, just roll them up, just cut them into nice thin ribbons, nice and rustic. You don’t have to worry about making it perfect. We’re going to set those in the corner. Then we’re going to take the stems. That’s basically what you’re looking for. We’re going to bring this stuff over to the line and I’m going to show you guys how to cook it.

So we have our skillet on medium heat; a little bit of olive oil. You can start to hear that sizzle and see that smoke coming up. That’s perfect. That’s exactly what you want. Then we’re going to take our aromatics – a little bit of sliced garlic. That sizzle, that smell, that’s exactly what you’re looking for. That nice aroma is coming up. You just want to work that garlic around a little bit. We’re going to add our nice Swiss chard stalks. These are a little bit crispier, obviously, and the leaves of these have to cook for a little bit longer. Basically what you want to do is you just want to saute these guys for about three, four minutes.

We’re going to season it with a little bit of cracked black pepper, some chili flakes. Then once these – once the garlic starts to get a nice little golden brown color, a little bit more translucent, we’re going to add our leaves in there and we’re just going to kind of steam the top of the leaves here for a second.

Then once you start to see your leaves turn a little bit wet and you start to hear that snap, that crackle, you’re pretty much good to go. So all you want to do now, you’re just going to plate the greens, show off those nice beautiful colors on those stems. Chinese pine nuts are a little bit cheaper than the Italian. Just toast them in a pan – no olive oil, no butter, nothing; just dry heat. Toast them off until they’re golden brown. Right on top, a touch of fresh black pepper, a little sea salt.

Then this is key. The greens need acid. So I take a fresh lemon and just squeeze it right over the top like that, about half a lemon, a touch of zest just to add a little bit more vibrant, a touch more acid. The best part – cheese; a little snow of parmesan right there. That’s it.

So there it is, a beautiful restaurant-style side dish that you can make at home in less than five minutes.