Sweet & Spicy Mustard Greens

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I’m trying to eat more greens…they are so good for you, so quick to fix, and soooo good to eat! Tonight it’s mustard greens…ruffled green leaves with an intense peppery kick. It’s been a while since I had these, and when I took a bite of a fresh leaf and that spiciness hit I got excited because I realized I could use asian bbq marinade that’s sitting in my fridge, leftover from the mushrooms we had the other night. I hate to waste anything – especially when I love it like I do that marinade!

Since joining Nutrimirror, I have gotten into the habit of weighing almost everything I eat – that way it makes it easy to get accurate nutritional stats. One day I’m going to get one of those fancy digital scales, but for now this $5 one from Walgreens does the trick just fine.

Like most greens, mustard greens need to be washed very well, and the way I like to do this is to rinse it under the faucet and then let it sit in a deep bowl of icy water while I attend to the other things like chopping onions and garlic. This is great for lettuces too – the cold water kicks it back up some if it’s getting a bit wilted. Throw some onions into the pan and sauté them in a tiny bit of olive or sesame oil until they are clear, then add the garlic – and as soon as that is the slightest bit brown, toss in the greens and the marinade. Cook it until it is just wilted and take it off the heat. I actually let mine go a tad too long here, but they were still yummy…

What I made tonight was a single serving:

• 3.5 ounces mustard greens
• 3 g onions (I diced in a hurry, but thinly sliced would be better AND had I had shallots, I’d have used them instead)
• 1 clove garlic (minced, but if you have time slice this thinly too)
• 5 g asian marinade
• .5 tsp olive oil

Asian BBQ Marinade: (from Vegetarian Times magazine)

• 1/2 cup Tamari (I used Braggs – that’s what my stats are for)
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1/4 sherry, saki or mirin (I used sherry)
• 6 cloves garlic (2 Tbs) (I tend to add more when I reuse the marinade since I like to eat most of the garlic)
• 1 Tbs sesame oil

A little of this goes a very long way. I marinated some mushrooms (excellent!) in it the other night and still have most of it left. I “used” about 5 grams of it in the greens but most of it was actually left in the pan, so the sugar count is likely less than this.

Calories 100
Total Fat 1.6 g
Saturated Fat 0.2 g
Cholesterol 0 mg
Sodium 748 mg
Total Carbohydrate 18 g
Dietary Fiber 7 g
Sugars 9 g
Protein 6 g
Vitamin A 1029 µg
Vitamin C 139 mg
Calcium 211 mg
Iron 3 mg

*Also includes nutrients like vitamin K, manganese, folate, vitamin E, triptophan, potassium, Vitamin B6, copper and phospherous.