Recipe from Saveur November 2015

I am always happy to find a recipe on Saveur because you can rely on them to come up with something interesting.  I love collards, but finding recipes beyond sautéing with ginger and garlic or the very traditional Southern style with bacon or hammock, can be a challenge.  This immediately caught my eye and it does sound really delicious, and you can use your turnip greens too.  I have had a dish similar to this one at a big annual African dinner we held in Sonoma County.  It was delicious!

2 lb Collard or Turnip Green leaves, roughly chopped (12 cups)

1 cup dried Shrimp

4 Scotch Bonnet or Habanero Chiles, stemmed, seeded, and finely chopped

1 1/2 medium Yellow Onions, (1 roughly chopped, 1/2 sliced into 1/4” thick rings)

1 Tomato, cored, seeded and roughly chopped - Since we don’t have ripe tomatoes yet I would use a little bit of my house made canned sauce

4 TB High Temp Vegetable Oil, the recipe calls for Red-Palm, but I would use Coconut instead

2 TB Tomato Paste - since I am planning on using my sauce I would skip this ingredient and cook my sauce down a bit

1/2 cup Natural Peanut butter

Kosher Salt and freshly ground Black Pepper

Bring 2 cups water to a boil in a large saucepan and season with salt.  Add the collard greens, cover, and cook until the leaves are tender and wilted, about 5 minutes.  Drain the leaves in a colander set over a bowl and reserve 1 cup of the cooking liquid.  Place the leaves and reserved liquid in a blender, puree until smooth, and scrape the paste into a bowl.  Clean the blender and return it to its base.  In the blender, combine  the dried shrimp with three-quarters of the chiles, half the chopped onion, and the fresh tomato and puree until smooth.  In a large saucepan, heat 2 TB oil over medium high.  Add the remaining half of the chopped onion and the tomato paste and cook, stirring constantly, until the onions are soft and lightly caramelized, 6 to 8 minutes.  Scrape the shrimp and tomato paste into the pan, reduce the heat to medium, and cook, stirring until lightly caramelized, about 5 minutes.  Remove the pan from the heat, stir in the pureed collard greens and peanut butter, and mash until evenly combined.  Season the greens with salt and pepper and scrape into a serving dish.  In a 10” skillet, heat the remaining 2 TB of oil over high, add the onion rings, and cook, stirring, until soft and slightly caramelized, about 5 minutes.  Arrange the onion rings over the collards and garnish with the remaining chile.

 

 

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