How To Prepare Artichokes For Cooking

Thorny, primitive-looking globe artichokes are a member of the thistle family and one of my favourite vegetables. People are often uncertain how to prepare artichokes for cooking. It’s easy once you know how, all you need is a lemon, a paring knife, a big bowl – and your artichokes of course.

Globe artichokes – not to be confused with potato-like Jerusalem artichokes which are a different vegetable altogether – are immature flower buds. The bud is surrounded by many large protective leaves (called bracts) with fleshy bases. These are what we want to eat, along with the heart (or base), and we need to do quite a bit of trimming to get to them.

Here’s how to prepare artichokes for cooking (scroll down for a step-by-step video).

1. Half fill a large bowl with cold water, squeeze half a lemon into it and place the other half alongside.
2. Trim off the artichoke stems, leaving about 1cm attached. Rub the cut sections with the lemon.
3. Working one artichoke at a time, remove the outer leaves until a green-yellow base appears.
4. Using a paring knife, peel the stem and trim the dark green from the artichoke base; rub exposed surfaces with the lemon.
5. Cut off and discard the top quarter to a third of the leaves; rub the cut surface with lemon.
6. Gently ease the leaves apart and place the artichoke in the lemon water.
7. Repeat with remaining artichokes, leaving them in the water until ready to cook.
8. If you’ll be serving the artichokes whole (for example as stuffed artichokes), use a teaspoon to scrape the hairy choke out of the centre of the leaves. If you’ll be halving or quartering the cooked artichokes, it’s easier to cut the choke away once they’re cooked.

Now you’re ready to make stuffed artichokes, raw artichoke salad or artichoke barigoule. Or, if you’d rather short-cut with preserved artichoke hearts, try this easy artichoke & white bean dip.