Vegetables Category

Bok choy has crunchy stems and crinkled, spinach-like leaves. It's usually stir-fried with other ingredients, but it can also be steamed or sautéed and served as a side dish. Small heads of bok choy are called baby bok choy (left), and they're more tender than the larger variety. Of the baby bok choys, bok choy sum = Canton bok choy has small yellow flowers (sum is the Chinese word for flower), while Shanghai bok choy is a uniform light green, doesn't have flowers, and isn't as sweet.

Boniatos aren't as sweet and moist as other sweet potatoes, but many people prefer their fluffier consistency and more delicate flavor. Store them at room temperature and use them soon after your purchase them, since they tend to spoil quickly.

This is a type of butterhead lettuce, with soft, tender leaves. It's terrific in salads and sandwiches, or the leaves can be used as a bed for other dishes.

This is a green variety of cauliflower.

Broccoli is tasty, good for you, and easy to cook. The florets can be steamed or boiled and served as a side dish, or served raw on a crudité platter, or stir-fried. The stems are good, too, but you should peel them first and cook them a little longer. Select broccoli that's dark green and fresh smelling.

This slightly bitter cooking green has long been popular in Italy and is now catching on in America. It's best to just eat the florets and leaves; the stems are quite bitter.

This is similar to broccoli, but its florets resemble pine cones. It's especially good raw.

These are rich in sulforaphane, a cancer-fighting compound. They also have a pleasant, peppery flavor.

Broccolini results from a cross between broccoli and Chinese broccoli. The slender stems resemble asparagus in flavor and texture.

These look like small cabbages, and they're most often boiled or steamed and served as a side dish. They have a rather strong flavor, so it's best not to pair them with anything that's delicately flavored. They don't store well, so use them within a day or two after purchasing.

This Italian heirloom pepper is shaped like a bull's horn, and many cooks think it's a lot more flavorful than an ordinary bell pepper.

Burdock is becoming increasingly popular in the United States, but it's already an important vegetable in Asia. It lends an interesting, earthy flavor to soups, stews, or stir-fried dishes. Select small, firm roots.

With sweet and creamy orange flesh, the buttercup is one of the more highly regarded winter squashes. The biggest shortcoming is that it tends to be a bit dry. Choose specimens that are heavy for their size.

This category includes Bibb lettuce and Boston lettuce.

This variety is very popular because it's so easy to use. It's small enough to serve a normal family without leftovers, and the rind is thin enough to peel off with a vegetable peeler. As an added bonus, the flavor is sweet, moist, and pleasantly nutty.

Cabbage is a nutritional powerhouse that can be eaten raw, usually in slaws, or steamed, boiled, or sautéed. Choose heads that are unblemished, smallish, and heavy for their size. They're cheapest and best in the late fall, winter, and early spring. Store them uncut and unwashed, in a plastic bag in the crisper section of your refrigerator. Many varieties will remain fresh for several weeks. Varieties include green cabbage, which is what recipes often mean when they simply say "cabbage," red cabbage, napa cabbage, savoy cabbage, su choy, Brussels sprouts, and kohlrabi.

These small sweet peppers come in different colors and looks like squished bell peppers. They're popular in the Caribbean, where they're often stuffed and roasted.

These are popular in Hispanic countries and throughout the Caribbean. They're large, so markets often cut them up before selling them.

This is a large, Spanish variety of green onion.

These are dried Anaheim chiles, and very mild.

These huge leaves are about a foot and a half long, and they're a popular vegetable among Pacific islanders and some Asians. Many Western cooks steer clear of them, though, since they must be cooked for at least 45 minutes to an hour to rid them of calcium oxalate, a toxin that irritates the throat if swallowed.

This vegetable is very likely an early ancestor of the artichoke. Its large, grayish-green stalks are somewhat bitter, but they remain popular in Italy and North Africa. You can find them in large produce markets in late fall.

These large, starchy potatoes have purple skins and white flesh. They're great mashed, but they don't hold their shape well, so they shouldn't be used in potato salads or scalloped potatoes.

Raw or cooked, carrots add sweetness and color to stews, soups, stir-fries, slaws, cakes, and crudité platters, plus they're a great source of Vitamin A. Try to buy them with the greens still attached, they're usually fresher and sweeter that way.

These are nicknamed rattle chiles because the seeds rattle when you shake them. They're a rich brown color and moderately hot.

People in Hispanic countries use cassavas much like Americans use potatoes. There's both a sweet and a bitter variety of cassava. The sweet one can be eaten raw, but the bitter one requires cooking to destroy the harmful prussic acid it contains. It's often best to buy frozen cassava, since the fresh kind is hard to peel. Look for it in Hispanic markets. It doesn't store well, so use it within a day or two of purchase.

This medium-hot Mexican chili is used to make tamales, marinades, stews and soups. It's got a fruity flavor with just a hint of tobacco.

Cauliflower florets often wind up in soups, or as a side dish smothered with a cheese sauce, or served raw on a crudité platter. Select heads that are heavy for their size.

These are very flavorful, but a bit chewy. They're good fried, or in soups or stews. Select small, young-looking heads.

These are often used in Cajun recipes. Green cayennes appear in the summer, while hotter red cayennes come out in the fall. They are very hot.

These are very hot, bright red chilies. Recipes that call for cayenne pepper are likely referring to a ground powder that goes by the same name, or possibly to the fresh version of the pepper.

This underrated vegetable is a relative of celery that's been developed for its root, which has a pleasant celery flavor. It's popular in France and Northern Europe, where it's usually peeled and cooked in stews or grated and served raw. Many large supermarkets carry celeriac; select smallish roots that are heavy for their size.

Raw celery is flavorful and wonderfully crunchy, and it's a great vehicle for dips or fillings like peanut butter or cream cheese. Celery can also be sautéed and used to flavor soups, stews, and sauces. A bunch or stalk of celery consists of a dozen or so individual ribs, with the tender innermost ribs called the celery heart.

This is a kind of lettuce that's grown for its stalk, which can be peeled, sliced, and stir-fried. Look for it in Asian markets.

These sweet Italian olives are large enough to stuff. Black Cerignolas are softer than green Cerignolas.

The fruit and seeds of the chanar tree are edible. In Chile, it is ground up to make a sauce (arrope). It is similar to honey or molasses.

Chanterelles are a whole family of mushrooms, most of which are quite choice, but the name is most often applied to the golden chanterelle = yellow chanterelle. These yellow mushrooms are highly prized for their exquisite flavor, color, and texture. Other tasty chanterelle varieties include the yellow foot chanterelle, which is less meaty and less flavorful than other varieties, the black trumpet mushroom, and the white chanterelle, which is similar to the golden chanterelle, but lighter in color. Fresh chanterelles are best; dried or canned chanterelles are less flavorful and tend to have a rubbery texture

This mild-flavored squash looks like a wrinkled, pale green pear. It needs to be cooked before serving, and for a longer time than other summer squash. You should peel a chayote before cooking it, but don't take the seed out--it's edible and tasty. Cooked chayotes make good low-fat substitutes for avocados.

Look for this in the produce section of Hispanic markets.

Along with pepperoncini, this is a good pickling pepper. They are moderately hot, and range in color from orange to bright red.

These are less than an inch in diameter, perfect for adding to salads or crudité platters, or grilling on skewers. There are both red and yellow varieties.

These resemble alfalfa sprouts, and can be harvested right off that ceramic chia pet you got as a gift.

This got its name because it has the texture of cooked chicken. You can sauté it or, if you want to make mock chicken, simmer it in chicken stock.

When dried, a chilaca pepper is called a pasilla chile. They are mild.