Southern Flavor, Lickety Split

I had a dilemma. A couple of dilemmas, actually. When I went to the grocery store to buy ingredients for my bolognese, one of the items I purchased was pancetta. The guy at the deli counter must have been new, because he over-sliced and I ended up with half a pound of pancetta instead of a quarter pound. So, what to do with all of this pancetta? My second dilemma is one that vexes me continuously. My refrigerator freezes my vegetables. I have had to ditch too many bags of salad greens because they get frozen. Moving the bags around doesn't seem to change the fact that greens get frozen in my refrigerator. I had a large bag of collard greens sitting there that needed to be cooked before the damage was irreversible. Pancetta, meet collard greens. Collard greens, meet pancetta.

Southern Style Collard Greens 

2 slices of pancetta, diced
1/2 onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, sliced
1 large bag of collard greens (I used Glory brand) very well rinsed *
3 cups chicken stock
1 t liquid smoke
1 T Worcestershire sauce
1/2 red pepper flakes
3 T red wine vinegar

* some recipes suggest you soak the greens for 30 minutes before cooking them.

With your cooker set to saute,  brown the pancetta, rendering the fat, for about 3 minutes. Next, add the diced onion and sliced garlic and cook until soft, this should take about 5 minutes. Be careful that you don't let the garlic burn. Add in the rinsed greens, smushing them down in the pot, along with the stock, liquid smoke, Worcestershire, red pepper and vinegar.

Secure the lid to your cooker, and lock it in place. Set it for 20 minutes at high pressure.  After the cooking is complete, turn it off, letting the pressure release naturally.

Word to the wise, let it cool just a teensy bit before you dig in. "Pot likker" gets mighty hot. And it's mighty tasty. The steam was rising off the pot. These greens were so tender, they practically melted. And they didn't take 2 hours to cook, either.