For the Best Roasted Vegetables, Start with Steam | Techniquely with Lan Lam

For perfect browning, texture, and tenderness, the best way to cook vegetables is to steam them and reverse sear, rather than roast. In this episode of Techniquely Lan Lam explains why.

Roasted Cabbage Recipe: https://cooks.io/4ikrvAr
Brussels Sprouts Recipe: https://cooks.io/4im78CQ
Roasted Fennel Recipe: https://cooks.io/4kJthga

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0:00 – Poorly Roasted Brussel Sprouts
0:34 – Reverse Seared Vegetables
1:20 – Prep the Vegetables
3:45 – Arrange the Vegetables
6:13 – Steam the Vegetables
8:42 – Brown the Vegetables
10:17 – Tasting

– No one wants sad
vegetables, like these, right? These sprouts were roasted and
they’re all over the place. You’ve got this piece right here. There’s not really any browning.
It’s not gonna taste great. We’ve got another one here. Okay color, but it’s mush. Gross. Eh, maybe not gross, but not good. There are a couple of perfect
ones, like this little piece. Beautiful uniform
browning. The cook is nice. How do we get all of our
sprouts to look like this? We reverse sear them. that’s typically associated with meat, usually flat cuts, like steaks or chops. When you reverse sear, you’re
gently cooking the meat at a low temp until it’s mostly done. Then, you sear the outside
to get great browning. This two-step approach, it’s
valuable because it minimizes the portion of meat that gets overcooked. For more details, you can check out my
video on how to cold sear. Just as we would with meat, we want to cook the inside
of our vegetables first, and then brown the outside. The most efficient way to cook
the inside is to use steam. Then we just need to crank
the temp and use enough oil to make sure that the heat is getting to the vegetables efficiently. But, before we can get to
any of that, let’s talk about an often overlooked part
of the process, the prep. (upbeat music) Unlike meat, pretty much all
vegetables come to us whole, and so they’re gonna need
some trimming and cutting. The two keys are to create flat edges and to make sure the pieces
are all about the same size. Fennel, cabbage and Brussels sprouts are some of my favorite
vegetables to reverse sear. There’s nothing tricky about this. We want flat sides that can sit flush against
a skillet or sheet pan because this is where we’re
gonna get most of the browning. So, I have my sprouts
here. They’re trimmed. I like to make sure
they’re compact and round. The taller they get, the
more stemmy they are, and it’s just not as good. But, cutting them in half is
pretty much as easy as that. So, for the cabbage, I want to
get eight wedges out of this. And I want to make sure
that the core stays intact, so the leaves don’t fall
apart as I’m working with it. They’re usually pretty centered. And I just kind of lay it down
and just cut straight down. Make sure you turn them flat side down. It’s gonna make everything a lot easier ’cause they won’t rock. And because I want to make sure that there’s enough core to
hold these two halves together, I actually like to kind of turn it up and set the knife along that edge. Kind of eyeball it before I slice. So next up, fennel. Got two heads here And I know how divisive fennel can be. If you’re one of those
people who doesn’t love that anise flavor of fresh fennel, you got to try it roasted. That anise aroma, it really kind of blows off
during the cooking process and what you’re left with is
super creamy and delicious. Just like with the
cabbage, there’s a core. The core is gonna hold
all the pieces in place and we want to make sure
that we divide this up so that every wedge has enough core. Just like before, flat side down. Half. And half again. Whatever vegetables
you’re reverse searing, you want to make sure that the pieces are all
about the same size. They don’t have to be identical,
but they need to be close because that’s gonna let them all finish cooking at the same time. Prepping the veg for roasting also means thinking about
the fat and the salt. Fat prevents sticking and
it helps with browning, while the salt seasons. The core technique is
gonna remain the same, but you do need to tweak that technique to suit the vegetable and the equipment. This Brussels sprouts recipe
is courtesy of Annie Petito. The cut sprouts, they
can go right in the pan. We’re gonna cook them and
there’s no need to dirty a bowl. I am going to take the time
to arrange them cut side down because that’s where the browning happens. It’s pretty typical for the sprouts to not quite fit in the pan,
and they’ll kind of come up the sides of the pan a little bit. That’s totally fine. They’re gonna shrink as they
cook and they’ll fit nicely by the time we get to the browning part. So, to help those cut
sides get good browning, I need to add a nice amount of oil. I am going to skip the salt because these are gonna get
dressed after they’re cooked. So, fennel’s got thick layers, and Keith Dresser has a great trick for seasoning them evenly. I’ve got a little bowl here. I’m gonna add some water and salt. I whisked my water and salt
together to make a brine. And these fennel wedges,
they’re gonna go right in there and we’ll give them a quick toss. Quick bit of pepper. And
a nice drizzle of oil. Now that they’re seasoned and oiled, I’m just gonna arrange
them on my sheet pan. Now that these are arranged,
this is almost ready to go. I do want to hold onto
this brine for later. Andrea Geary’s roasted cabbage
also calls for a sheet pan. This time, instead of just tossing those cabbage wedges in a bowl, I need to be a little bit more careful. I’m just gonna arrange them on the pan. Rather than drizzling kind of randomly, I’m gonna actually use
a brush to put that oil exactly where I want it to be. Because there’s so much more leaf here for the core to hold onto, you have to just be a
little bit more careful. Now we’re just seasoning with salt. And after I get all of these
in place, I’ll flip them over and oil and salt the second side. (upbeat music) Okay, our veg is ready for steaming. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) Steaming is an easy and
effective way to cook vegetables, but, you can’t have steam without water. That water can come from the
vegetables or you can add it. How do you know if you need to add water? Unfortunately, there
isn’t an easy formula. That said, anything that needs
more time to cook through, whether it’s because it’s really dense or you’ve cut it into large pieces, it’s gonna benefit from added water. These sprouts have thin leaves that are quick to cook through. As they cook, heat damages their cells and water gets released. We just need to pop a lid on
this pan to trap that water. Cabbage also has thin
leaves that cook quickly. So, we can just cover the
sheet pan tightly with foil to trap the water once it’s released. Fennel’s got thicker layers
that take more time to cook. These wedges are gonna require a little bit more water
than the fennel contains, so we’ll pour the extra
brine from the bowl right into the pan. Now we can cover this with foil. Without the lid or foil,
steam would just fly off. On the stove, that’s gonna mean that the sprouts are
gonna brown on the bottom, but the rounded sides
that are pointing up, they’re gonna stay pretty close to raw unless we toss them
occasionally as they cook. But that’s gonna cause a new problem. The flat sides that we want to brown, they’re not gonna be seeing the pan for long enough to get good color. In the oven, the tops and sides
of the cabbage and fennel, they do see heat, but it’s a dry heat, and that’s gonna make the
surfaces leathery and dry. But with steam, we can avoid
all of that. Here’s why. Steam is just water,
right? Well, yes and no. When you’ve got liquid water in a pan, those water molecules are
loosely bonded to each other. If you pump enough heat
into that liquid water, they’re gonna rise as steam. These free-floating water molecules, they can’t escape the pan
though because of the lid. Eventually, they’re gonna land
on something that’s cooler. And that’s when the magic, no, that’s when the science happens. What happens? Heat naturally flows from
hot things to cool things, so the heat that was in
those water molecules, it’s gonna get transferred to the food. That water molecule no
longer has the energy to fly around freely, so it’s
gonna condense on the food, where it’ll eventually kind of flow down into the bottom of the pan,
absorb heat and fly up again. That’s how steaming works. We’re using water to deliver
heat to the bits of food that aren’t in contact with the hot pan. And the condensing water also keeps surfaces from drying out. Depending on what you’re cooking, steaming is gonna take
between 5 to 20 minutes. (upbeat music) What once the veg is mostly cooked, that steam, it’s no longer helpful. In fact, it’s gonna keep
the temperatures in the pan too low for browning. This is when we want to ditch the lid and let all of that steam escape. That allows temperatures
to rise high enough for Maillard browning and caramelization. For our sprouts, we’re
just gonna remove the lid and keep an eye on them as they brown. It’s gonna take about two, three minutes for our fennel and cabbage. We remove the foil, let
the first side brown, before flipping to brown the second side. The key to great browning isn’t just getting rid
of the water, though. We also want to make sure
that the heat from the pan is getting transferred
to the food efficiently. Cooking can cause foods
to change their shape. And things that were
flat when they were raw, they’re not gonna be quite
as flat once they’re cooked. So, what we need is
something to fill in the gaps between the metal pan and the food. That thing, it’s oil. Just as we use water to transfer heat to the bits of food that
weren’t touching the pan, we’re gonna use oil to
do the same thing here. Oil won’t vaporize at the
temperatures we’re working with, so the only parts that
it’s transferring heat to are the cut sides that are really close, but not quite touching the pan. I’m just gonna dress my veggies and then let’s get to tasting. (upbeat music) So, here’s what we end up with. Three plates of gorgeous vegetables, with beautiful browning, and
they’re cooked perfectly. Let’s start with the sprouts. It’s so nice to not have to
pick and choose the best ones. They all look great. So, after they were done cooking, I dressed them with a maple vinegarette. And on top, just a sprinkling
of chopped smoked almonds. It’s awesome. Smoky, sweet and fantastic. Check out this cabbage. I haven’t swooshed anything
in, I don’t know, 13, 14 years, but I still got it. It’s kind of nice to need a
knife for your vegetables. They deserve that. (upbeat music) I don’t know if you’ve ever had perfectly cooked,
perfectly browned cabbage, but, you’ve got to try it. That cabbage is kind of sweet,
it’s delicate, it’s tender. The little sesame seeds and scallions, they’re just the perfect accompaniment. Last up, our roasted fennel. I know how divisive fennel can be, but everyone who thinks
they don’t like fennel, you’ve got to give this a try as well. It’s just transformed
by this cooking method. Super creamy, delicately sweet, a hint of that savory, chary bitterness that compliments all those sweet flavors. The bulbs are just bringing this kind of soft vegetable creaminess. It’s fantastic. I love this method for cooking vegetables, and I think you’re gonna love it too. Check out AmericasTestKitchen.com
for recipes where we’ve done the work of figuring out all of the details for you. You could reverse sear vegetables like cauliflower,
broccoli, delicata squash. What vegetables do you think would benefit from being cooked this way? Let me know in the comments which vegetables you’d reverse sear.