Tuesday eating from your yard tip on okra Even if you couldn’t eat okra it is a striking plant and flower in the garden~the yummy seed pods are an added bonus! I was first introduced to okra by some friends from Ghana with it cooked in spicy tomato gravy served over rice, which is still my favorite!! Then I tried tempura okra and I was enamored. My okra cookbook has okra pickled, in casseroles, scalloped and even a couple bread recipes.
It is best to pick the okra when they are finger sized before they get tough and develop spines. This can seriously require checking your okra a couple times a day because the seed pods grow at lightning speed.
When you have a glut of okra, slice the okra pods up and freeze them for winter use. Bob Henrickson uses his food dehydrator to dry sliced okra for wintertime soups. Mark Jeter
cooks the okra with tomatoes, green/jalapeño peppers, onions and green beans and freezes it to add to soups and leftovers.
While some folks object to the slime, it thickens your sauce and soups and helps with digestion. My friend Muriel Naas Mason, who is a child of the south, sautés okra with onion, garlic and tomatoes. Her tip to get rid of the slime is to add a little vinegar when your cooking okra. Becki Barnes learned to cook the sliced okra low and slow in butter to get rid of the slime, then she just adds a little salt and pepper. Linell Connolly adds okra to her “dump soup” because the slime adds body to soup. Sara Zimbelman uses okra when making her gumbo base.
Romnie Bivin has happy memories of her grandma making okra with onion, tomatoes and various other vegis served over rice. Trâm Dương told me about okra in sweet and sour fish soup with pineapple, bean sprouts, tomatoes and tamarind. Sara D. Cave’s top choice is pickled with pearl onions, jalapeños and carrots. Lezlie Abbott adds okra to her bhindi masala and corn meal fried okra with Louisiana hot sauce. Stacey Walsh also likes the fried okra with bacon bits. Karl Fredrickson suggested drizzling okra with olive oil followed by a dusting of your favorite spice rub, then put on skewers and grilled to a light char of grill marks. Laura Walther Schaefer roasts the seeds with olive oil and salt. Finally Madeleine Duffy Madsen gets down to their basic goodness and eats them raw.
Okra is eaten in most warm regions of the world ~ all those people can’t be misguided in their love of okra. How do you eat okra?
