Buttery Braised Endives for One

I’m participating in a Progressive Party at Kitchen-Play where this month’s menu is sponsored by endive.com. I’m not a big fan of raw endive, but the idea of braising this peppery bitter vegetable in butter sounded perfect. So I recreated Sippity Sup’s Julia-inspired recipe for Butter Braised Endive!

The other night, my husband was kind enough to text me from work to ask if I needed anything from the grocery store. I texted back with a short list and then sent an addendum asking for endives, but had failed to specify a quantity. This was a typical situation where I thought “eight” and figured through the power of telepathy, this information would be transmitted to his brain. Perhaps it was the barometric interference from the impending snow storm, but he came home with only two heads of endive. Two.

I was really craving this buttery braised dish that Greg of Sippity Sup prepared the Julia way so I loosely interpolated the recipe for a single serving and also thought about how I could drastically cut the braising time. The endives that I had were fairly large so I decided to cut them in half so that they could cook a bit faster. All in all, the dish was finished in about 45 minutes. The result? Braising transforms the endives into both a hearty AND light vegetable dish. I will definitely make this again!

Buttery Braised Endive
Serves 1-2

2 heads of endive, halved
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/8 cup of water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
salt

Place endives, cut side down, in a small skillet. Add the remaining ingredients and bring to a high simmer over medium heat for about 15 minutes. Cover with parchment paper cut to size of the skillet or partially cover with a lid. Turn the heat to medium low and continue simmering for about 20-30 minutes or until the endive is very tender. Add water as needed so that there is always about a 1/4-inch of liquid in the pan. Add salt to taste and serve warm.