Below is a quick and simple recipe for sautéed garlic and ginger bok choy (adapted from www.steamykitchen.com). Giamarese Farm CSA members received bok choy on the first week of the season. We also have bok choy available seasonally in the Farm Market. This recipe adds carrots plus sesame oil is used to sauté the garlic and ginger (and carrots), longer over lower heat, rather than drizzled on top at the end.
1.) You will need the following ingredients:
- Two carrot chunks, almost 2 inches long ~ optional
- Three cloves of garlic
- One ginger "coin" about 1/4 inch thick
- About 2 tablespoons of sesame oil
- Broth (vegetable, chicken, etc.) ~ optional
2.) You can use a rotary cheese grater to shred the carrots if you like a challenge. I used the newer OXO garlic press (# 11107400) to mince the garlic. This hefty press is a vast improvement over their previous flimsy model and crushes almonds, walnuts, pecans and more. Use a spoon rather than a knife to remove the outer bark from the ginger coin. A Microplane grater makes fine work of the ginger coin. Click here to learn more about how to "Peel, Chop and Grate Ginger"...
3.) Coat the bottom of a fry pan with sesame oil. Place the garlic and ginger in the cold oil and the shredded carrots in a heap along the edge of the pan. Mix the garlic and ginger together in the center of the pan and sauté over low heat for about 10 minutes or more making sure they don't burn. Keep the carrots towards the edge so they don't soak up all the oil, flipping the pile on occasion to lightly and evenly coat with oil.
4.) While the garlic and ginger (and carrots) are sautéing, clean the bok choy. Start by peeling unwanted leaves from the outside. Peel off the larger, outer leaves and rinse off any sand or debris. I peeled all the leaves except the smallest, inner-most and rinsed those as well. You can also cut the bottom of the stem off and the leaves will separate. Place the bok choy in a spaghetti pot (within a colander insert if you have one), fill with water and soak for a few minutes. You can agitate the water and mix the leaves around to help loosen sand and debris.
5.) Drain the bok choy and rinse the leaves by hand. You can use your thumb to scrub any leftover sand or debris or just remove that part of the leaf. Pat the leaves dry or give them a good shake. Turn up the heat to medium on the garlic and ginger until they start to sizzle. Mop up the oil with the leaves using tongs or a spatula or similar utensils. Mix the shredded carrots into the oil-coated bok choy leaves.
6.) You can add broth 1/8 to 1/4 inch deep and cover depending on how long you want to steam the leaves (one or two minutes or until the liquid has evaporated). A longer steam will give the dark green part a texture and flavor like cooked spinach. Or you can just sauté the leaves briefly without adding the broth at all (bok choy can be eaten raw).
