I was explaining to my friend Juanita, in Columbia the other day what I was cooking for dinner. It was a dish I call garlic chicken. It is pretty easy and lasts for a few days and is even pretty good cold, but popping it into the microwave for a minute on high, works too. The dish is your basic pasta dish. For a serving of four I take a whole chicken or you can just use breasts so four to five medium sized breasts. I line a large sauce pan with olive oil and add a pinch of salt and pepper if you wish to taste, I skip it personally. Then add the chicken after dicing it into good sized chunks or strips if you prefer. add these to the pan. I put balsamic vinegar on it generously but not drenched, while this is cooking over medium heat, start boiling the water for my pasta, take your choice on this I use pene, fusilla, but even basic spaghetti works.  I  then grab a fresh large garlic bulb complete, and peel it into cloves. When the balsamic vinegar starts to coat the chicken I turn it and add artichoke hearts, just from a can, quartered but you can use the frozen ones as well. I plop the pasta into the now boiling water and add two thirds of the garlic.... I have a garlic press, but you could chop it if you do not. In about 10 minutes the pasta is ready to drain in a colander, I add the rest of the garlic and cook it for a minute or two. then dump the contents of the saucepan on the pasta and serve. There are several variations on this such as adding black olives...... 

    Juanita suddenly asked me what was an artichoke. Ahhhhh, an artichoke is the most noble of vegetables I answered. I showed her three of these pictures and she was quite curious and was anxious to try them. Well if you know artichokes you know this is not exactly the easiest thing to explain to one who is unenlightened with the magic of this vegetable..... particularly in a chat on Yahoo. There are many exciting dishes with artichokes, yet really, one has to start with the basics. One needs to experience the tease, and patience that is required to get to the treasure, that is the heart. The artichoke is like poetry, unless you have studied it and know meter and rhyme, (the basic elements of poetry) you are missing the essence of poetry. To simply write in free verse in some creative structured lines is really not poetry, nor it is not all that poetry can be. The artichoke is like this.... sure you would enjoy some artichoke soup or my dish, but until you have mastered the raw form of artichokes you really won't understand the vegetable as you should. Like anything one needs to start with the basics, before advancing.

     Juanita was planning cook for her fifteen year old son and asked me if he would hate artichokes. On the contrary I said, he will think it is the coolest adventure since he learned to use chop sticks at a Chinese restaurant. I explained the adventure like this, after she told me that she had seen the noble vegetable at the market: 

    Select three large artichokes around the circumference of a baseball ( for my Indian friends about a cricket ball), because places do vend the tiny variety that are useless for our adventure. To begin boil cool water in a large vessel, cut the bottom of the artichoke so it will lie flat, about 1/8th of an inch ( just a bit). Put the artichokes into the boiling water and cook uncovered for 30- 45 minutes. The artichoke is done when a fork is able to easily pierce the bottom where you cut. Now there are many many dipping sauces for the delicious artichoke. In the US we generally use either melted butter (or margarine) and lemon or lime. Some like to add a spice such as cayenne pepper to the sauce, others use mayonnaise and lime and again you can add a spice. With the wealth of Indian spices and dipping sauces there is a sauce for every taste, a curry or chutney also works but it is important not to drown out the unique taste of the artichoke, the sauce should accent it rather than overpower it. 

Now comes the tricky part or parts as the case is here. The leaves are peeled and pulled off one by one with all of the anticipation of a strip tease. Early on, we find larger leaf with significant meat, the meat is located on the inside bottom or fat part of the leaf. How this is eaten is a matter of great debate, so I suggested her, to try both methods.The thing is that after dipping  the meaty portion, some scrape the meat off of the artichoke using their top front teeth and others flip it over and use their bottom teeth. The debate is not really much of one, as the lower teeth get more meat yet the upper teeth have more aesthetic appeal... in say a formal setting. 

As we move closer to our treasure the the leafs get smaller and smaller, however the edible portion grows lengthwise on each leaf. While we eat our way to the reward we find each leaf becoming smaller, redder. and the tips becoming pointed and sharp as they guard the treasure that awaits our discovery. See, I told you it was sexy. For the artichoke is a finger food for the most part and is accepted as such universally. Our artichoke is soon looking like a small volcano in shape and be advised that it can be hot as we move toward our objective, the heart. 

Certainly their are many accepted methods to exposing and fully undressing our prize. I use the rudimentary one of the flat knife. Taking the small volcano, between my thumb and forefinger I pull off the remaining leafs to uncover some bristles much as in a hair brush or cacti. These bristles or follicles are not edible. One can either pull them out on clumps or attempt to delicately scrape them off with the edge of the flat knife. It is worth noting that should you rush, you will bruise the heart, a definite faux pas at a dinner party.A sharp knife is inferior because it too bruises our scrumptious objective. When I have eliminated all (and I mean every single hair) from my heart ,we find it reminiscent of goose bumps or actually the reverse. Goose bumps sometimes known as chicken skin are the bumps one gets when the skin becomes excited or traumatised, much as when a lover touches us unexpectedly. The top of the heart is then ready, but there is still a bit of undressing to do. This would be the trimming of any part green as in the same color as the original leaf, the lighter green is edible. Once the artichoke is naked and defenceless, it is time to taste it. It can be wolfed or savored using the same dipping sauce or something fresh. 

You might wonder why I suggested three artichokes for two people.... Like many things, one is a bit of a tease, also sharing one is an art form in itself. I am wondering if my Indian friends have some unique sauces or if they boil them as I do or keep the nutrients in by steaming as a rule?