By Denise Zito
The kitchen question for August is: What in the world to do with all the garden chard? My fallback is to sauté it with garlic and oil, because of course everything tastes good sautéed in garlic and oil! But I wanted something different so the other day I conjured up a fritter that I believe is good enough for company. I used shallots instead of onion for a milder flavor, since these fritters aren’t cooked very long and I added a chili that I pulled out of the freezer, from last year’s garden, to add a little zip (maybe your peppers are already ripe?). Cooked this way the chard takes on a beautiful bright green color and the lacy fritters are quite lovely to behold.
Swiss Chard Fritters
- 2 cups chopped chard
- 1 shallot, minced
- 1 chili pepper, minced
- 2 eggs
- 2 T soft butter
- ¾ cup cornmeal
- ½ to ¾ cup milk
- Vegetable oil for frying
Beat the butter with the eggs till smooth, add the cornmeal and then enough of the milk to form a batter. Stir in the chard, shallots and the chili. The mixture is rough and clumpy but just dump a half cupful into the heated oil… you can probably fit three at a time in your frying pan.
Turn gently when brown and cook the other side. Like any pancake, the second batch won’t take as long as the first.
Drain on paper towels and serve immediately with a dollop of Greek yogurt if you wish. Makes 6 large fritters.
