The Laughing Cow – Post 2

This is sponsored content from BlogHer and The Laughing Cow.

We eat a lot vegetables in our house. In fact, I like to think that I cook a way above average amount of vegetables. Black beans, blackeyed peas, green beans, asparagus, butterbeans, corn, squash, carrots, tomatoes, okra, sweet potatoes, eggplant – all of these things are regular parts of our diet.

But.

I was born and raised in Mississippi. I spent the first three years of my married life in south Louisiana. And I now live in Alabama. And while we do eat healthily for the most part, I occasionally call upon my Southern cooking heritage when it comes to adding bacon and butter to our vegetables. So while I feel confident telling you that you could stop by our house on almost any night of the week and find several vegetables from which to choose, you should probably know in advance that you might not be eating them steamed and flavored with the teeniest bit of olive oil when you visit.

However, I think you’ll find that you’ll appreciate the temporary vacation from worries about your cholesterol when you experience that first taste of bacon fat in your peas.

Yes ma’am. Pass the cornbread. Please and thank you.

So just in case you’ve never experienced the joy of preparing and eating vegetables in the Deep South – I thought I’d offer a brief tutorial here today. You probably wouldn’t want to follow these rules all the time, but every once in awhile it’s good to kick up your soul food heels. And while it is not necessary for you to visit your cardiologist before implementing these methods in your own cooking, it is certainly recommended. As I always like to say, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of really good butter.

Amen.

1) If there’s no form of pork product in your vegetable, you’re doing something wrong.

I grew up knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that pigs and vegetables are BFFs. They go together like peas and, well, ham hocks. And even when I cook vegetables that aren’t traditional Southern staple – like black beans – I like to fry a little bacon, remove it from the pan, and then use those bacon drippings to season my beans. Which leads us straight to tip #2…

2) A little bit of bacon makes every vegetable better.

Sprinkle some crumbled bacon on a cooked sweet potato. Or mix it up in some green beans with sugar and vinegar. Or stir it up with some eggplant, onion, garlic and butter. Or add it to your bread crumbs when you’re dredging green tomatoes. YOU CAN’T GO WRONG. And more importantly? Your life will never be the same.

3) Go big with real butter or go home.

Now contrary to what you might think, I’m not advocating that you use large quantities of butter when you cook vegetables. But I am advocating that you use real butter. Nothing from a tub. Nothing that “tastes like” butter. I’m talking about the real deal butter – the best thing that ever happened to baked sweet potatoes or fresh squash. I’d rather use a teaspoon of the real stuff than a tablespoon of the fake stuff. Let’s embrace the real-live butter. It’s the right thing to do.

So. There you have it. The three primary ways I like to take perfectly healthy foods and occasionally make them significantly less healthy. And I’m so grateful that you’ve joined me on this somewhat fat-laden portion of my culinary journey.

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Happy Laughing, everybody!

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