A Woman is like an artichoke, you must work hard to get to her heart.

Quote by: -Inspector Jacques Clouseau in The Pink Panther (2006)

Spring is the best time to find perfect artichokes; big, green, and full of leaves. This beautiful vegetable is not only delicious but it is also high in fiber and antioxidants, lowers cholesterol, and is good for your liver. It may look intimidating and difficult to cook at first, but once you try it out you will find that it is very easy!

Image via Delallo

Tip: when selecting an artichoke look for a heavy, firm, and healthy green color with lots of leaves. The bigger the better, and the bigger the heart.

Last night we made a delicious dish with steamed artichoke and a mayonnaise/lemon dip. We paired it with an Arabic dish called mujaddara (مجدرة‎) which has rice, lentils, cumin, and sauteed onions. The two went very well together and by the time we finished eating our stomachs were very satisfied. Here is the final product, sorry about the picture quality.

Our version of the recipe:
-You can either boil the artichoke or if you have a large enough steamer pot you can use that.
-After washing the artichoke cut off the stems and pluck off the bottom leaves.
-Once the water has boiled, place the artichokes with stems facing upwards.
-To make sure the whole artichoke is submerged into the water you can place a plate on top to push them down and cover with the lid.
-Depending on the size of the artichoke it will take about 30-45 minutes for it to cook.
-You can tell if it is cooked when the outer leaves can easily be pulled off.

Quick Dip recipe:
-All you need is a tablespoon of mayonnaise and half a lemon (you can adjust the amount of lemon)
-Scoop the mayonnaise into a bowl (we used a tea cup as you can see)
-Juice the lemon and pour into the cup with the mayonnaise
-Start whisking away and voilà.

Our favorite part of eating an artichoke is the process of peeling off each leaf, one by one, until you get to the best part, the heart! It's kind of like Christmas and Hanukkah (our favorite holidays), you get to open a bunch of gifts and eventually you get to open up the best one.