Cooking Spinach

Cooking spinach only takes a few minutes and it's well worth doing from scratch rather than buying the frozen or canned varieties. Those work fine in many recipes that require cooked spinach but really the flavour and texture of the fresh leaves can't be beaten.

Just don't forget that spinach reduces dramatically when it's cooked so cook plenty. If you are serving it as a side dish, a large bunch will only serve 2 or 3 people once it is cooked.

Here's How To Cook Spinach

1. Wash the spinach really well by rubbing the leaves with your fingers under cold running water.  Sometimes gritty soil likes to stick to spinach leaves, particularly if you’ve grown the spinach yourself or have bought it from a farmers’ market. Many supermarkets sell pre-washed leaves.  I still like to rinse these.  After washing, drain the spinach in a colander, giving it a good shake to remove excess water.

 

2. Next, trim any hard or woody stalks from your spinach and roughly chop the leaves.  If you are using baby spinach leaves, you won’t need to do this.  These stalks are small and will be very tender when you cook the spinach.

3. When you are cooking spinach, don't add any liquid. Spinach contains a lot of moisture already.
Adding water will quickly make it soggy and tasteless. The droplets of water that cling to the leaves after washing will be enough to cook the spinach.



4. Place the spinach in a large pot over a medium heat.  If you like, you can add a little splash of olive oil and some crushed garlic.  The olive oil is for flavour.  Leave it out if you would prefer to keep your spinach fat free.  In 1 to 2 minutes, the leaves will begin to wilt.  Stir a couple of times and remove from the heat immediately.  

5.  Season with a little salt and crushed black pepper if you like and your spinach is ready to serve as it is for a simple side dish.  

If you are cooking spinach for a recipe like cannelloni or tofu quiche, you need to give the leaves a really good squeeze once they have cooled to make sure you remove any excess liquid.

Some spinach recipes to try:

Baked Spinach And Chickpea Recipe

Bulgur Recipe: Bulgur Pilaf With Feta And Spinach

Delicious Tofu Quiche: Smoked Tofu, Spinach And Tomato Tart

Veggie Pizza Recipe With Feta, Spinach And Pine Nut Pizza

Vegetarian Stew: Sweet Potato And Peanut Stew With Spinach

Easy Cannelloni Recipe With Spinach And Ricotta

Roasted Shallot, Parmesan And Spinach Salad Recipes

Spinach And Chickpea Curry Recipe

Potato Cake Recipe With Spinach And Parmesan




 

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