Artichoke heaven: How to best enjoy

It has come to my shocking and surprising attention recently that very few people know how to properly eat an artichoke.

This revelation is highly unfortunate as the artichoke is among the most underrated foods.

Feel free to take notes here:

(Also, most Chicago restaurants rarely serve it correctly, usually stuffing it with breadcrumbs, roasting it, or serving it cut and sliced in demented and sadistic ways.)

So cruel. Better to follow these proper steps.

First, boil the artichoke in a big pot of boiling water. I suggest 20 minutes. Then, drip the artichoke out and dry it while heating some butter in a smaller nearby pan. Place the artichoke on a plate and pour the hot butter into a separate dipping cup.

Then slowly and delicately pull off one leaf at a time, take the meaty end of the leaf, and dip it in the butter. Insert in mouth, meaty end first, and scrape that end with your front teeth for a proper grip to get the delicious taste.

Do this one leaf at a time, and make sure you have another large plate on hand for each of the "discarded" now-eaten leaves.

It's a slow but savory sumptuous way to eat the artichoke… but wait. The best part is yet to come!

When all the "meat" from the leaves has been eaten, and the 'choke' is as barren as trees in the winter, you now cut the remaining part—the "heart of the artichoke"-- off from the stem. It will be a little lighter colored and shaped slightly like a saucer with a slight curve.

Then, cut this scrumptious portion into four pieces and pour the remaining butter over it and salt to taste.

Pure heaven, guaranteed. The heart is the best part.

I grew up eating an artichoke like this, so I assumed everyone else did. But revelations have come to me over the years that it is quite the opposite; people seem shockingly naive when it comes to eating this green leafy treat.

I should thank my parents for introducing me to the real way to eat this wonderful vegetable. It almost makes up for those dreaded few nights when they would serve us liver for dinner.

But that is a story for a different day.