Mhm…I don’t know, broccoli aren’t bitter in this recipe. Maybe because you have to boil ‘em?
Garlic MUST not cover! This is ine of the most common errors when cooking italian. The recipe must not have the “taste of garlic”.
The maintaste must always be that of the main ingredient (broccoli, in this case). The hint of garlic and anchovy serves to enhance the maintaste, and shouldn’t cover it.
I don’t think they smell bad in the first place. At least not if you cook them correctly or eat them raw; I suppose they start smelling a bit weird if you let them cook for too long.
I’m with @Someone, hell is full of brocolli.
I’m convinced there is some genetic marker that makes certain people taste the bitterness and others not at all.
I’m not sure, but I have always thought that a long boil is the way to take away that strong flavour from the thing. It goes in the air, though. When you go inside a flat where an old lady is cooking cabbage or broccoli, all the staircase is full of its smell.
No. Cabbage and especially broccoli are containing Glucosinolate. These are sulfur compounds. Similar substances are in mustard and makes it spicy/hot. If you cook the vegetables you can smell these sulfur compounds.
Indeed there is. Some people can eat cabbage and others can’t. So one shouldn’t force his kids to eat these things if they don’t like them! Use other vegetables instead.
Maybe you’re right. Actually I don’t think broccoli are bitter at all. On the contrary I’ve always thought they are way more sweet than many other vegetables. But maybe it’s just the way you cook it, I don’t know.
Have you ever tasted chicory? Or turnip greens (Stängelkohl, cime di rapa).
THAT’s biiter.
But maybe it’s also a cultural thing.
Example: in Italy you don’t find all the soft drinks you can find in USA*. Americans are usually disappointed about that. And they don’t understand why we have just Coke, Pepsi, Fanta and that’s more or less it. That’s simple:
They are way too sweet.
Italian soft drinks (like cedrata, spuma or chinotto) are traditionally much bitter (like to make an example, Tonic Water, which is not italian but is better known). One really famous italian soft drink is even called “Sanbitter” (which stands for San Pellegrino Bitter).
Oh, when I wrote we have Fanta, i meant Fanta ORANGE. All the other fancy colorful variations are not existent here. But we have Fanta Chinotto (sold only in Italy) and Fanta Bitter Orange (Italy, Ucraina). Did I mentioned that EVERY orange soft drink in italy, of any producer, comes also in the “bitter orange” version?
I’ve seen a Youtube video in which americans tasted chinotto, and they were all disgusted.
Is Tonic Water appreciated?
I love it, especially with a good Gin an a lot of ice 
Maybe it’s the same with food, I don’t know.
*an interesting fact about Dr. Pepper: it was introduced in Italy in 1989. It lasted less than 1 year. I remember it was a must for one month, when everybody tried it. Then everybody stopped buying it.
Another cultural difference is maybe linked to the colours… I can’t understand how drinks of this hues could be attractive:
The average italian is suspicious about those artificial colours, as if you’re “drinking chemicals”.
@Calypso Sorry, we did
it again…
What vegetables do you like? Most of 'em are bitter. It’s more that I like bitter and I don’t like kind of cloyingly sweet stuff that is all too prevalent in the Netherlands. Like @Ema I also like bitter lemon/tonic water and think most pop is an abomination.
The first time I had a hot cocoa in Germany was a revelation. At first it was “HOLY BEEP, NO SUGAR 
” and then when I gave it a chance it became “HOLY BEEP, NO SUGAR 
”.
These days I do drink cocoa milk, seldom hot (too much effort), sometimes with fruit. Figs go along very well, dried and fresh alike.
(Incidentally, I guess the i in fig is difficult for Italians. I had some trouble figuring out that a FEEK was a fig at one point. 
)
I don’t know, “taking away the flavor” sounds to me like “just don’t eat it if you don’t like it.” 
The stereotypical old lady cooks the life out of food to the point where it’s basically flavorless and therefore unlikely to cause offense.
That’s cool if you don’t like flavor I suppose, but I like flavor and something to chew on.
Well yes, but that’s if you go boiling it for hours. If you stir-fry it or toss it in salted boiling water it’s cooked before it starts smelling. Basically by the point it starts smelling it’s lost its bite and becomes kind of gross and mushy anyway.
I love chicory. They’re quite popular here in Belgium in general, which is probably why they’re also known as Belgian endives.
Too lazy to quote, sorry.
I don’t like milk chocolate, for example. I tolerate dark 70%, but my fav is 85%. Sometimes even 99%.
With “taking away the flavour” I was referring to the flavour of sulphur descrobed by @Someone , not the flavour of broccoli. Actually, the sulphur taste covers the broccoli flavour, which is VERY subtle.
Or maybe you can see it both ways: broccoli can have TWO flavours.
Try the subtle one, you’ll love it.
About, italian issues with vowels… I’m too lazy to link the language thread, but…
Italian is a difficult language. The only thing which is easy is the pronunciation.
Every vowel has a unique (with the exception of o and e, which have two) sound.
The sound for “I” is "ee ", period. That’s why that’s so diffiult for us.
hard to tell the difference between a ship and a sheep, or a shit and a sheet…
Finally, chicory… I wrote chicory, but in our cuisine it has so many varietis…
Indivia Belga, cicoria, puntarelle, catalogna, radicchio (Which, in turn, has many sub-varieties…)
EDIT: the post was broken. I completed it.
Warning: That depends on where you order the hot cocoa. Some Germans like the cocoa very sweet and in some restaurants you get a sweet version (with a lot of sugar).
/edit:
Depends on the vegetable. You can smell some sorts of cabbage very early in the cooking process.
Very few! I think they’re best consumed in a soup (like carrots and celery). True that Americans consume too much sugar and more processed food than Italians but I don’t think that’s related. Most people I know like brocolli just fine. When there’s a big pot of brocolli boiling it stinks up the whole place amd I literally want to 
I like broccoli, but I agree: the cooking smell stinks.
A fresh chewed bubble gum sticking on the street or the pavement/sidewalk.
…not to mention the one sticking under your shoe…
That´s interesting. Maybe you should wear a ring or something on your finger showing people that you are.
If this were a Simpsons Fan Forum I wouldn´t seem any special.
A synonym would be “Google”…
You don´t believe I remember all of these, do you?
Hehehe, now I want to hear you guys read things in English too 
On the subject of vegetables: I like broccoli. The mushiness of it doesn’t put me off. And I don’t like the taste of cabbage.
I’m not sure. It’s a pretty innocuous herb so I don’t know why I’m so offended by it. There really aren’t many things I won’t eat, but dill is firmly on the list. The slow feeling of dread when I realise it’s snuck into my fishcake like a Russian spy or some sort of Trojan makes me sooooo mad.
Who knows. Maybe I had a bad experience as a child or something
