Collard greens and chicken

Tonight for supper, I fixed collard greens, roasted chicken thighs and boiled potato fingerlings.

This was my first time cooking fresh collard greens. I had fixed canned collard and mustard and turnip greens, and fresh turnip greens, but never fresh collard greens until tonight. Considering that 54 of my first 60 years were spent in Texas, not fixing fresh collard greens was a lapse in my culinary education.

The recipe was a fancy one from a “We know what is good for you” magazine. Not a single part of the recipe called for stirring; everything was tossed.

As in step 1 – put 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper on an edged baking pan. Toss chicken and a pint of cherry tomatoes until chicken and tomatoes are covered.

Now anybody can figure out real quick that when you put four chicken thighs and a pint of tomatoes on an edged baking pan, you aren’t going to toss any of it. If you do, something is going to wind up tossed onto the floor.

What I did was, I put the oil on the pan, added salt and pepper, and mixed it all up and spread it all over the pan. Then I took a fork and stuck a thigh and wallowed it around the oil and then turned it over and wallowed the other side. When all four thighs were sufficiently wallowed, I poured on the tomatoes and took a spoon and moved them around in the oil.

While the chicken-tomatoes cooked, I tore the greens and washed them twice. Then I heated olive oil, salt and pepper in a stew pot and added a sliced onion and then, using a spatula “tossed” the onion for a few minutes. The recipe said use a large skillet, but I’m not sure you can buy a skillet large enough to hold collard greens.

When the onions were sufficiently “tossed,” I added about a third of the greens and cooked them for about 20 minutes, “tossing” as needed, using the spatula.

All in all, the meal turned out OK.

I have a whole lot of uncooked greens left over, though.