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Broccoli
A cool season vegetable, high in Vitamin C, beta carotene, folic acid, potassium, broccoli are among your very best friends. They used to be in the Cruciferae (mustard) family (four petals in the shape of a cross was the reason for the name -- crucifix, et al), but have been subdivided into what is now called Brassicales.
Stephano and Andrea D'Arrigo, Italian immigrant brothers, were responsible for taking this Italian vegetable and naturalizing it in California in 1922. Thereafter, it made the slow transition from exotic plant to table staple.
Whether steamed, shredded and cooked, or eaten raw, broccoli has excellent fiber content and contains an important anti-cancer component called glucoraphanin. If you like eating radishes, kohlrabi and cauliflower raw, then you'll love the stems -- with salt (if you are not hypertensive!). In fact, the stems are great shredded and cooked like cabbage with a bit of vinegar, oil and sugar to taste.
There are several different kinds of broccoli crosses -- not crucifix crosses, genetic variations! Mixed breed broccoli is commonplace on your market's shelves. For your edification, the kind of broccoli we have here in the U.S. is called 'sprouting' or 'Italian Green'! But here are two types of mixes:
Broccolini is a cross between broccoli and Chinese kale.
Broccoflower is a cross between broccoli and cauliflower and is a lighter shade of green, but looks like a solid head of cauliflower.
And if you can afford them, broccoli sprouts have super high concentrations of sulforaphane, which contains the chemically important anti-cancer component glucoraphanin.
Storage of broccoli is extremely easy if you follow this procedure. Like any cut stalk from flowers to celery, put cool tap water into a bowl and re-cut the broccoli stalk under the water. Leave it there for about two minutes. The water will fill up the cells of the broccoli with liquid instead of air and preserve the freshness of the broccoli for much longer than if you just put it into your refrigerator straight from the store.
Additionally, if you take the time after soaking the stem in water to put the broccoli into an airtight baggie and then literally suck out the air (not just pressing out the air, but actually putting the baggie tightly to your lips and inhaling!), you can preserve broccoli's freshness in your refrigerator for up to three weeks! Worth a try, no?
What you should like most about broccoli if you are overweight and looking for an easy way to lose some weight is that it is a negative energy food. That term is used here to indicate that your body uses more of its fat reserves to digest it than the broccoli supplies! Ahem, unless you drown it in cheese or salad dressing!
Happy eating!
