Baby Artichokes

My first experience with baby artichokes was a messy and painful one at first but as I got through about 20 of them I figured out a little trick that helped me breeze through the rest of the batch. I realized that the top of the artichoke was the part with sharpest needles, so before I started peeling off the leaves I cut the top off of each artichoke. Only about a half an inch or so but it made a huge difference.

Artichokes brown very quickly after being cleaned so I filled a container with water and lemon juice (2-3 lemons). Supposedly, the acid from the lemons prevents them from browning.

We had some extra beer batter laying around, and I thought that it would be a cool idea. But first I needed to cook the artichokes and a quick boil would do the trick. About 15 minutes or so until they were tender.


BEER BATTER:

2 cups AP FLOUR
1 bottle of BEER
2 EGGS
2 tsp SALT
1 tsp PEPPER
1 tsp PAPRIKA

(Like I said the batter was already made but the recipe is very simple. Throw the dry ingredients + the eggs into a mixing bowl and hit them with a hand mixer while slowly pouring in the beer. The batter works better when on the thicker side so you might not need the whole bottle of beer.)

I ran some cold water over the artichokes to make the next steps a little easier, and then grabbed a frying pan with about a cup of vegetable oil. I dipped each artichoke into the batter one by one and gently placed them into the hot oil cooking until golden brown on each side, then removed them from the oil onto a plate covered with a couple of paper towels to soak up the excess oil.

Best if served hot with either Marinara sauce or skordalia (potato & garlic dip).

ENJOY!