How to Prepare Artichoke for Cooking

New cooks often don't know where to begin preparing artichokes for cooking, let alone cooking them. Artichokes look intimidating first hand, but they are actually not that difficult to cut and peel. Follow tutorial for how to prepare a fresh artichoke.

Things You'll Need

• Artichokes, any size
• Paring knife or serrated knife
• Cutting knife
• Melon baller (optional)
• 1 lemon, qaurtered (optional)

Instructions

1. Cut the stems off of the artichoke bottoms. This make them sit upright on your cutting board so it's easier for you to work on them.

2. Cut with a paring knife or serrated knife the spiky, tough outer leaves off and discard. You can peel the larger leaves with your fingers, snapping them off from their base. Be careful not to sting your fingers with the pointy leaf edges.

3. 

   Cut or peel until you reach the inner soft yellow/pale green leaves. The inner edible leaves are that we call "artichoke hearts". If there are fuzzy dark green tops on the yellow/pale green leaves, slice them off with a paring knife, or scrape them off with a melon baller. Any dark leaves are tough; therefore hard to digest.

4. 

   Leave the peeled artichoke as is, or cut in half. For jumbo artichokes, you can quarter them. Now, if you want to keep your artichoke from turning brown before cooking, rub the leaves with lemon wedges (anti-oxidation agent). You now have artichokes ready to cook.

   ※ Alternatively, you can peel the edible leaves off for cooking, instead of leaving them on the stems. But this takes time and effort. However, certain dishes require doing so, for example, using artichokes for a soup or pizza recipe.

Tips & Warnings

• Visit link under the "Resources" section for my other article on steaming and eating artichokes.

Resources

• How to Steam and Eat Artichokes