To peel, or not to peel?
October 2, 2009
As I was chopping a bunch of ingredients for tomorrow’s lunch (duck ragu – trying out a Ms Martini number from the white book, but adding a bit of this and that), I realised that I pretty much never peel vegetables, unless absolutely necessary because the skin is too hard or lumpy to eat.
I may as well admit that I almost never skin or de-seed tomatoes, regardless of instructions – what’s a bit of tomato skin between friends? I do peel parsnips and sweet potato, and lumpy stuff like celeriac, but if I can avoid it, I do. Mostly because I can’t be bothered, but I also hate the idea of the waste – that, and my mother’s voice ringing in my ears, insisting that half the vegetable’s nutrients are in the skin. Is this true, or just one of those things mothers say when they can’t be bothered peeling?
What about you – peeler, or no?
How to shuck an oyster 
I have read that about the nutrients too – so your mother was right I reckon. A scrub goes a long way. There are some great carrots around now that have really thin skins and cook up nicely. And I LOVE the skins on new potatoes.
That deseeding tomato razzamatazz IS wasteful, unless you’re Shannon Bennett (two t’s?) I suppose.
For a while there, I used to peel carrots in these kind of zebra stripes because a. my children wouldn’t eat unpeeled carrots; b. I heard all the nutrients are in the peel; c. I wanted my children to not just eat the carrot, but eat the carrot’s nutrients; and d. all parents go through embarrassingly earnest times (don’t they?).
Peel hardly anything these days. And never peel potatoes (sp?). I love mashed potato with the peels mixed in. Though my Dad used to do this wonderful thing when he made chips. Peel the potatoes, make the chips, then make potato peel chips. They were awesome.