Ho, ho, hearts of palm

My last post was somewhat more from the heart than is customary for me - which leads seamlessly on to this one, concerning a tin of...Hearts of Palm.

Old label

New label

I'd bought this one quite some time ago - so long, in fact, that they've changed the label design since - but only tried it very recently, in an attempt to use up some of the more out-of-date specimens in my cupboard. Green Giant are of course best known for their sweetcorn, and the iconic chuckle/jingle which has featured in their adverts for donkey's years, but they do also produce a few speciality products, of which the hearts of palm is one. The company's website suggests describes them as "a tender and mild delicacy from the heart of the palm tree. Try them in salads, on pizza, or served with antipasto." I can't believe they're a very big seller; a tin seems to retail at about £2.40 whichever supermarket you go to, which isn't cheap for tinned veg. I think I must have got mine when the whole Green Giant range was on offer somewhere.

From the picture on both versions of the label they look like short white logs, almost like a candle without the wick. The reality is not all that different for once, though slightly more flaccid than depicted. You can just make out an inner core to each, with a ring surrounding it, which is more noticeable when you bite into one (and later on cooking with them). "Tender and mild" is quite an accurate description, and they have a flavour not unlike a globe artichoke.

But how to use them? The serving suggestion depicted on the old label is little help, just showing them lying on a plate. On the updated label they appear to have balanced a couple of rather pert chives on top of them, but I felt I should probably do more than that. Sadly the recipe page of the website doesn't contain any suggestions using hearts of palm - it's all ho, ho, ho; corn, corn, corn.

#wewantplates

I remembered that I had actually tried hearts of palm before, when on holiday in Mauritius a few years back. I visited a rum distillery there, whose restaurant offered a set menu with each course featuring rum as an ingredient. The starter was "Hearts of Palm Three Ways", which as I recall were (left to right as pictured): a remoulade-style salad, a slice cooked in a sort of cheesy gratin, and a mini-tower with smoked salmon and cream cheese. The blobs on the slate  must have been rum sauce of some kind. My memory is a little hazy - there was quite a lot of rum involved that day. All three were delicious, but perhaps a bit fiddly to try to recreate. Whether they had used tinned hearts of palm I don't know, but given the location it's quite feasible that the chef had nipped out of the back door of the kitchen, lopped down a palm tree and butchered it to extract its tender and mild hearts for that day's service.

Entrance to the Rhumerie de Chamarel, Mauritius. Home of delicious palms, and even more delicious rums.

Going through my old photos also reminded me that some time ago I had been flicking through the pages of an cookbook of Caribbean recipes, probably from the early 90s, which featured this "sophisticated appetiser from Martinique" using hearts of palm from a tin, alongside fresh mango, avocado and lettuce:

Wow. It's not often you see a dish that attempts to recreate the form one of its ingredients through its presentation. When growing up I used to push my florets of broccoli around the plate so they were all standing upright to look like trees, but this takes the idea to a whole new level. Tempted as I was to recreate the sophistication of this 'picture on a plate', I trawled the internet for further inspiration. Unexpectedly, I found myself on the website of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), which has a section featuring a range of vegan recipes. I was attracted to its suggestion of pan-seared slices of hearts of palm, largely because from the photo they looked a lot like seared scallops, which I'm a big fan of. It was also incredibly simple - just slice the hearts of palm, whack them in a hot pan for a few minutes each side, season with cayenne pepper and serve with salad or vegetables.

I didn't quite follow the recipe to the letter though. As I mentioned, I really like scallops, which go very well with bacon...so I fried a couple of rashers first, then did the hearts of palm slices in some of the bacon fat. Not sure the PETA people would have approved, but with a blob of apple sauce too it was very a tasty light meal.

Seared scallops hearts of palm - inner core and outer circle more clearly visible here.

Elsewhere online, I came across another vegan recipe, this time for BBQ Heart of Palm Sandwiches, essentially using the vegetable as a replacement for pulled pork. Indeed, the hearts of palm do lend themselves very well to being pulled apart into strips, which you then toss with barbecue sauce. I already had a bottle of this in the fridge, so didn't feel the need to follow the fairly lengthy recipe to make my own. Stick it in a bap, with some coleslaw or similar if it takes your fancy (I was being particularly lazy so just went for another blob of apple sauce) and there you go. The texture isn't quite as close to pulled pork as the recipe makes out - the hearts of palm are a bit softer, without the real meaty bite that pork has, but it's not a bad substitute.

After all that I did still have one heart of palm log left. By sheer coincidence, a supermarket I went into happened to have an avocado and a mango in its reduced section, as both were at their sell-by date (and already looking like they were past it). So, naturally, I took the sophisticated option:

Sophistication on a plate

I added to it slightly by grilling the slices of palm heart and sprinkling with grated parmesan (a suggestion I'd seen in another recipe online), which I think adds something to the scene, giving the stem of the palm tree an authentically 'hairy' look. As I say though, the mango and avocado were past their best, so it looks like a palm tree that's seen better days, but given that the tin was so out of date, perhaps it's quite fitting. Not sure I could 'palm this off' to my guests at a sophisticated dinner party though...ho, ho, ho.

A final note - I always take off the labels off my tins before they go in the recycling - and this tin was unlike any I'd seen before. The ridges seem to be double the size of a normal one - a tin not to be messed with!

Phwoar, look at those ridges