Collard Greens

Collards are a staple of the South. Unlike kale or more delicate greens, these stand up well to the long-low-slow cooking mantra that permeates much of staple Southern cooking. Here's the recipe for collards that works for me. One thing to note: with collards, you want to go from field to pot as quickly as possible. If you're buying them out of somebody's truck because they picked them that day and you'll cook them that night, you're doing it right.


Collard Greens

1 medium videlia onion
2 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
2 tbsp olive oil
1 smoked hamhock
1 qt. low-sodium chicken stock 
3-4 lbs collards with stems included (after the stems are removed and the greens are chopped, these will reduce down to about 2 lbs of raw greens for the recipe)
1/4 -1/2 cup apple cider vinegar (Eyeball it.)
2 tbsp sugar
Pickled whole jalapeno (more peppers if you like more heat to your greens)
Salt
Pepper


Begin by heating the olive oil in a 4 qt or larger pot over medium-high heat (I use a 4 qt cast iron dutch oven, but a large stock pot will do just as well, you'll just have to stir more often to keep things from sticking). Slice the onion in half from root to tip, then into thin half-rounds. Add the onion to the warm oil. Smash the garlic, then add that too. Saute, stirring occasionally, until the onions are soft and translucent.

Add the hamhock, the chicken stock, and 2 cups water. Stir, and leave over medium-high heat until the stock begins to simmer. Turn the heat down until the whole thing is just at the edge of a boil, then cover the pot and let simmer covered for 45 minutes. Stir it once or twice, but in general just leave it alone.

In the meantime, you can be prepping the collards. Collards often are quite dirty, which means you need to wash them. I like to rinse them under water, then cut the thick stems out of the large leafs. Slice the leafs into 1 1/2 inch ribbons, and then further into fork-manageable pieces. After slicing, run a decent quantity of water into a large bowl or a sink and dunk your collard pieces. The collards will float, the dirt will sink. Leave them to sit for a few minutes, stirring very gently. This will get the rest of the dirt possibly left over from the fields off your collard leaves, and keep your dish from feeling gritty. After a few minutes, skim the collard leaves off the top of the water, leaving the dirt and grit on the bottom of your sink/bowl. Place your clean leaves in a colander to drain while they wait for the hamhock to simmer.

After 45 minutes, add the collard greens to the hamhock and stock mixture. Pour in the sugar, the vinegar, and a little salt (I usually go for about a generous teaspoon here. Don't oversalt it, you can correct the seasonings later). Add a pickled whole jalapeno or two depending on how much bite you like with your greens. DO NOT COVER THE POT. You want some of that liquid to evaporate, to concentrate the pot liquor. Wait until the mixture resumes a low boil, and leave it at that temperature for at least an hour. The timing here is not precise, you can go for up to two or even more hours depending on how large/old your greens were, how much greens you're cooking, how tender you like your collards, etc. Cook them for at the very least an hour, though, until the stems are tender and melting and there's no trace of bitterness in the greens. Taste, and adjust for salt and pepper about ten minutes before you intend to serve. You can add more vinegar or sugar here too, if the tang of the greens needs adjusting.

To serve, fish the hamhock out of the pot and pull the meat off it with a fork, throwing the ham in small chunks back into the greens. Discard the rest of the hamhock. Stir to mix the ham bits evenly with the greens, then use a slotted spoon to fish the ham-and-greens out of the pot liquor and into a serving dish. Serve with a bottle of pepper vinegar and hot sauce on the table, so that diners can adjust their collards to their preferred tang and heat.

Serves: 4-5