Saturday, September 25, 2010

Help! Artichoke advice needed

Mr artichoke and sons
 I'm notoriously bad at knowing when to pick fruit and vegies, and tend to leave it that little bit too long.  I have my first globe artichoke here.  I blogged about it earlier in the week but it seems to have progressed quite a lot since then and now has two tiny hangeronerers on each side.   My question is: is this artichoke ready for the picking or should I leave it a bit longer.  Part of me says 'pick it!', the other bit of me (and I suspect it's the dominant 'leave it' part) says 'don't be a fool, it's only young'.  Does anyone have any suggestions? Advice?

Oh and any cooking suggestions while you're at it?

mf of an artichoke plant

2 comments:

  1. I haven't actually grown them myself but based on my experience of buying them it looks like it could be ready to pick, also you can buy baby artichokes. Though it might not go very far when you cook it. It looks very impressive.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Your comment came a day after the eating, Katya. Thanks though. After previous indecision-induced mistakes, I thought I'd just pick it. It was really delicious, and for one person it was more than enough. There are little babies still growing on the sides of the stalk - and I suspect those are what you get when you buy 'baby artichokes'. A guess, anyway.

    ReplyDelete