Oh Baby, Spinach

Baby spinach is just about he most amazing vegetable alive. I might even write a poem about it one day. You can pop it into almost any dish and there’s no harm because there’s hardly any taste to it. But, it’s one more vegetable counted toward that daily quota. Ground up, it’s essentially the secret ingredient in all of those kids’ recipes where adults try to sneak in vegetables under the radar.

As I said earlier this week, my main problem with fresh produce is that it often seems to go bad before I use it up — or I just plain forget about it. The only time I use all of my fresh produce is when I do an entire week’s meal plan before heading to the grocery store. I’m sure there are quite a few Classics, Smart Structures and Organic Structures who do this successfully. But, when you’re busy, it doesn’t always happen. Unless you’re a Fun who loves to cook and then I figure you can come up with amazing dishes no matter what’s in your fridge. But, baby spinach is my solution.

First, it’s supposedly a “super food” which I guess just means it’s packed with everything under the sun that’s good for you. I love it because I’m able to find a way to use it all up without it going bad (almost always.) I put it in pasta sauces, chili, my morning fruit shake, etc. I use it as the base for all of my salads. Just whip up some salad dressing and add some crumbled cheese, a few raisins (or other dried fruit) and voila gourmet salad!

When the spinach starts to wilt, I fry it up with some garlic and serve it as a side dish. Sometimes I toast some pine nuts and soak raisins in water and toss them in there as well (I wonder if dried cherries might taste good in that recipe?) Now if I was a more competent cook, I could probably think of a zillion other ways to use it. So feel free to chime in! Today’s photo is Wal-Mart’s organic spinach offering. So if Wal-Mart’s got it (an organic version no less) then perhaps this tip is already beyond ubiquitous??