Green things. Not always appealing if you are not a fan of eating your veggies. Well, unfortunately vegetables are extremely good for you. Especially those green ones. They may seem unappealing at times, but there is something that can do to make your veggies at least a little bit more appealing.

Have you ever had nasty, over-cooked,  dull-looking veg staring up at you from your plate? The poor little guys didn’t even stand a chance. Not even the most willing of vegetable eaters would find this sight appealing.

These Green Beans look a bit sad right?

So how can you fix this? How can you preserve those amazing vegetable pigments and transform your meal from a veggie funeral, to a lively garden party on your plate?

Blanch your green vegetables!

Blanching your vegetables not only ensures that they will be cooked properly, but they will also look more alive and appealing.

What they should look like after blanching. Nice and green.

To blanch your vegetables:

You will need: an ice bath ( a bowl of water with ice in it )

A pot of boiling salted water.

Procedure:

Bring the pot of salted water to a boil. Place your vegetables into the boiling water just until tender and bright green. After you blanch your vegetables, you should really only have to toss them in a bit of oil to warm and season them. They should be tender, but not mushy. Al dente. Once they have reached your desired tenderness, fish out your veggies with a spider or some tongs and place them in an ice bath. ( this stops the cooking process so they don’t keep cooking after you have pulled them out of the water ). Let them sit in the water for a couple of minutes and then place them on some paper towels to dry until ready to cook. ( Don’t forget to clean your green beans if you have not yet done so )

To finish cooking them, you only need to warm them in the pan with your desired fat and seasonings of choice.

This is what your green beans should look like finished. ( before you put them on the plate of course ) Don't mind the iphone photo.

Plate them up!

From here on out you should be eating your green vegetables like they are mean to be. Green.

I made the mistake of over-cooking my Thanksgiving mashed potatoes. The result? An awesomely gummy mash that I was most definitely ashamed of. I did the best I could do to fix them… which meant hiding it under the Turkey ( or in my case chicken ). Not exactly ideal. After hours in the kitchen I decided that using a ricer for my potatoes would just be too much work. So I whipped out a hand mixer. Mistake #2. So how do you get those deliciously creamy mashed potatoes?

First off: pick the right potatoes. You want a potato that is high in starch. Like Russets, or Yukon Golds. ( I will also mention that you should make sure to buy these organic because potatoes are loaded with pesticides. )

Procedures:

You will get the best result for mashed potatoes by baking your potatoes in the oven. This really helps dry them out so that they can absorb all the creamy buttery goodness you are about to dump into them. Only one problem– this takes 40 minutes to an hour, and if you forget to poke your potatoes with a fork, you will have a hot mess in the oven to clean up afterwards. ( Potatoes will explode if you don’t poke holes in them. It is amusing but not worth the clean up. )

The second best and faster method is boiling your potatoes.Yep. Fill up that pot with water, dice up your potatoes and throw them in. I am sure you have done this before.

Always start your potatoes in cold water, and let them come to temperature with the water. I also like to salt my water a bit.

After your potatoes are fork/knife tender ( you can insert a knife easily through the potato ) but not falling apart drain your potatoes and return them to the pan. Put them back on the stove and place them over low heat and stir them until they dry out and there is no water left in the pan. Let them sit for a few minutes while you warm up the milk.

Always use warm milk for your potatoes. It keeps your potatoes nice and warm, and helps melt the butter.

After you have allowed your potatoes to sit for a few minutes. It is time to rice them.

A ricer is like a huge garlic press. Only, for potatoes. Just pop them in the ricer and press down until you get something that looks like this:

Kind of looks like rice right?

Here is where you add the butter and the warm milk.

Then stir it up, add salt, pepper, garlic etc. until nice and creamy and delicious.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!