Vegetables for vitality: broccoli

Super-high in fibre and vitamins and jam-packed with phytochemicals that help fight off disease, broccoli is one of the healthiest stars of the vegetable world. Read on to find out why.

Packed into 250 millilitres (one cup) of broccoli:

• less than 25 calories
• more than a day's requirement for vitamin C
• almost half a day's requirement for vitamin A
• folate to fight birth defects
• calcium to fight bone disease
• indoles to fight cancer

Season

Broccoli is at its best and most abundant in mid-fall through the winter.

What to look for

Select dark green heads and leaves and bright green stems. The stalks holding the florets should be slender and crisp and the florets themselves tightly closed and uniformly green. Yellowed, flowering buds are a sign of old age and a toughness that longer cooking can't cure.

Storing

Keep in a plastic bag in the vegetable drawer of the refrigerator for three or four days.

Preparation

• Wash well. Peel tough skin from stalks with a swivel-bladed peeler or sharp paring knife, if desired.
• If cooking long spears with florets attached, slice spears lengthwise as far up as the florets.
• The leaves are full of vitamins and good flavour and can be cooked. Add to soups or stir-fries.

Basic cooking 

Short cooking time brings out the best flavour and colour and helps prevent broccoli's valuable vitamins from leaching into the cooking water. It also prevents the breakdown of chemicals in broccoli that release strong-smelling sulfur compounds that smell like rotten eggs. Blanch, steam, sauté or stir-fry florets and chopped-up stems and leaves with a little added liquid for just three to five minutes.

Best uses in recipes

• Raw broccoli often features on vegetable platters for dips or in salads. Broccoli florets can be sautéed with olive oil and garlic, added at the beginning of a vegetable stir-fry, or steamed and topped with cheese sauce, white sauce or a squeeze of fresh lemon juice.
• Broccoli stems and leaves can be cooked in chicken stock as the base for a cream of broccoli soup: Purée the cooked broccoli, add milk or cream and season to taste with salt, pepper and a little oregano.

• Broccoli stalks, which many people discard, are tender and tasty parts of the plant that can be put to good use in cooking.
• Cut stalks into thin rounds and add to stir-fries. Blanch, steam or stir-fry broccoli stems.
• Or, grate them coarsely and serve raw in salads or slaws.
• Purée cooked broccoli with a little chicken stock, some milk or cream, a pinch of dried marjoram and a seasoning of cayenne pepper and salt to make a quick, creamy soup.