Cooking In and On Leaves

OK, colour me curious. I have a large number of recipes that call for me to cook things in various types of leaves - Canna, Banana, Fig, Grape, Cabbage, etc. I'm curious about you chefs up in North America and Europe - beyond the standard cabbage rolls and dolmades, what do you use large leaves for in the kitchen?

I use the grape trimmings as a bed for lamb and the fresh leaves get stuffed with various goods. I have banana leaf envy regarding some neighbors and am considering offering a trade. The fig leaves from the neighbor's tree have wrapped fish on the grill as well as a Vietnamese ground pork mixture. I love the subtle flavor that the slight charring gives the contents of the packages. Both the grape and fig leaves have been on the grill with a bit of cheese wrapped inside.

My use of leaves is mostly for stuffing. Grape, mulberry, cabbage, Brussel sprout (not the small ones but the big leaves on the stalk), Kale, collards and lettuce are all game. I have used banana for wrapping but not for eating.

have nothing to contribute, but love this topic! I've been curious about using grape leaves fresh, and any other kind of leaves one can use. Well, aside from dolmas (not a big fan) and German cabbage rolls (like them but would not make them). I'd have to roam the neighborhood at night for banana leaves, but might just plant a tree for that purpose, already have a laurel and a kaffir lime tree for that same reason :-)

hopefully there'll be lots of input here, as I really love the look of something cooked on/in leaves. And the taste.

Grilling fish and meat in banana leaves is one of life's great, simple pleasures. Pick your favorite SE Asian treatment/marinade, tie the protein in the leaves with strips of other leaves (or wrap in aluminum foil), and grill until done.

Corn husks are also a great wrap for Mexican grilled meats and fish.

Corn husks are also a great wrap for Mexican grilled meats and fish.

And they work well for grilling corn. Soak and sear.

Sorrel grows like a weed here - it started in one large pot and has self-seeded itself all over the place so I now have five pots of it, plus a few freewheeling plants in the ground.

I wrap all kinds of things in the leaves. I don't much care for lamb but I love goat meat and chunks of goat meat, which is quite sweet, has a great affinity for sorrel - the flavors balance and enhance each other.

I use grape, fig, avocado and raspberry leaves that friends give me.

I grow nasturtiums and use both the leaves and flowers in salads and occasionally I grow amaranth both for seeds and for the leaves. The big-leaf variety Amaranthus caudatus is a big, hardy plant in my area that produces a lot of leaves and a lot of seeds. It's not one of the usual ornamental varieties.

In Sicily they wrap meatballs in lemon leaves and grill or bake. Gives a wonderful aroma and flavour to the meat.

in yucatan (southern state of mexico) they cook a pork butt in banana leaves called cochinita pibil.

I'll bite, since I started the topic, and also since I grow Canna, Heliconia, Ginger, and Bananas for leaves to use in cooking. These are strictly outer wrapper leaves and aren't meant to be eaten, but they do impart a lovely flavour to the food.

Ecuador's traditional in-leaf/on-leaf dishes include: Humitas (Corn husks), Tamales (Banana leaves), and Quimbolitos (Canna leaves), all of which are breads; Maito (Heliconia leaves) and Ayampaco (Ginger leaves), both of which are fish dishes but can also be made with game meats; a version of Cochinita Pibil (Banana leaves), and a type of shrimp dumpling wrapped in ginger or Canna. In the Chinese sectors of the larger cities, you can also get sticky rice wrapped in banana or ginger leaves, and on the coast the African uses for banana leaves surface.

I make most of these things in my own kitchen (apart from the Cochinita, as I don't like pork), as well as using chard, cabbage, and grape leaves for stuffed rolls.

in yucatan (southern state of mexico) they cook a pork butt in banana leaves called cochinita pibil.

When I saw this post that was the first dish I thought of. I've made a version of this without cooking the pork butt in the banana leaves and it was most certainly not the same and not as good. Banana leaves are also great for cooking fish -- I've found that just about any fish I would cook en papillote does fairly well cooked in a banana leaf. I have no idea what I'm doing half the time, but cooking in banana leaves lends dishes a central american flair that I like.

There's also a distinctive flavour that the banana leaf gives the fish, which can't be obtained any other way. Same goes for dumplings (I'm thinking of Vietnamese Banh Gio) that are normally steamed in banana leaf - without it, there's something missing.

On a tangentially related note, does anybody else here eat banana flowers?

Turmeric leaves are used for steaming some dishes. They add a certain fragrance.

Then there's also jackfruit leaves, which are used to make little cups and idli batter is steamed in it. Beautiful pictures here.

I've roasted salmon fillets in fig leaves before. It turned out pretty good.

OK, as promised in the Dinner thread: here's a how-to for wrapping fish in banana leaves. Last night's dinner used Tilapia fillets because the fishmonger didn't have anything whole that looked tasty. The leaves in this example are from a Red Iholene banana plant, which has a nice sort of dark-coppery sheen on the undersides of its leaves, and which needed a leaf removed yesterday. Fish cooked this way poaches in its own juices and ends up pleasantly firm (rather than mushy).

1. Select the leaves and remove from the midrib (if you've got fresh leaves. Lay them upside-down. (Photo shows the difference between upper and lower leaf surfaces).

2. Lay the fish in the center of the leaf. Make sure you leave enough space on all sides to wrap inwards at least 3/4 of the way over the fish.

3. Spices! In this example, I'm using Yellow Seasoning (a blend of mustard, thyme, oregano, nutmeg, and turmeric), Hungarian Paprika, fresh cracked black pepper, and various garden herbs, along with striped lemon and my golden plum sauce from the January harvest.

4. Wrap it up. Begin by bringing the top and bottom (the long edges) together over the fish, then fold the ends up and secure with toothpicks. This takes a bit of practice, but is basically quite simple once you get the hang of it - it's like folding an envelope.

5. Bake at 350 F (180 C) for 30 minutes.

Before:

After:

6. Open carefully - the leaves will be a bit crispy but still flexible.

7. Plate up and enjoy!

Beautifully executed, PanCan.

I keep meaning to mention hoba miso in this thread. We tasted it on our trip to Takayama, Japan last year: it essentially seems to be miso spread on a dried magnolia leaf and grilled. Sometimes on its own, sometimes with beef and other ingredients, as seen here:

Takayama was very much geared to tourism, so packages of the leaves were available for sale everywhere. I resisted the urge, since I imagine Border Services would have had issues with me bringing them back to Canada. But I still think of the preparation every time I see a magnolia tree.

I keep meaning to mention hoba miso in this thread. We tasted it on our trip to Takayama, Japan last year: it essentially seems to be miso spread on a dried magnolia leaf and grilled. Sometimes on its own, sometimes with beef and other ingredients, as seen here:

Takayama was very much geared to tourism, so packages of the leaves were available for sale everywhere. I resisted the urge, since I imagine Border Services would have had issues with me bringing them back to Canada. But I still think of the preparation every time I see a magnolia tree.

What sort of flavor did the magnolia leaf impart? Do you know if it is a particular variety of magnolia? Any idea if it would work with fresh ones?

No salt Panaderia?

BM - with banana leaves, it's not really necessary. Banana leaves on their own are quite salty, and I've found (through extensive trial and error) that it's best not to salt meats that are cooked in them until I've tried a little bit, and then adjust to taste. The potatoes that accompanied the dish, however, were cooked in a seawater-equivalent brine with saffron pollen and provided a really nice counterpoint.

Also, in my household, the general rule (obeyed in all cases except for paprikash and banana beef) is that I don't salt anything in the pan - this comes from the people eating preferring vastly different levels of saltiness in their food. I'm happy with just a bare pinch in most cases, my mother likes more, and if I were to salt things in the pan for my father, nobody else would consider them edible.

What sort of flavor did the magnolia leaf impart? Do you know if it is a particular variety of magnolia? Any idea if it would work with fresh ones?

As far as I could tell, the magnolia leaf imparted no flavour at all. But then, miso itself can be a pretty strong flavour. I suspect it was just a receptacle to hold the miso close to a flame. I don't know about variety, either; I tried to engage in some discussion at one restaurant, but my Japanese is weak, and her English wasn't great either. I'd love to get more info on the technique, but it doesn't seem to be widely discussed!

I can think of two leaves that I have used that have not yet been mentioned:

- Dried lotus leaves

- Taro leaves

What do you cook on Taro leaves? I'm more familiar with their use as a vegetable.

Panaderia Canadiense,

Not on but in. Patrel is a dish made in the States of Maharashtra and Gujarat. I have a recipe but in French here. It's a paste of spiced chickpea flour that's rolled, steamed, sliced (and sometimes fried) and then served.

Dried lotus leaf is good for wrapping sticky/glutinous rice.

There are also many Vietnamese recipes where beef is wrapped in betel leaf and barbequed.

Malaysian otak otak in banana leaves. And chicken in pandanus leaves.