Artichokes should come with a pamphlet like the ones they give you at the school clinic. Am I prepared for a relationship with this vegetable? Do I understand the potential consequences? How do I know when I'm ready?

I mean, I've had artichoke dip, of course, and artichoke hearts from a can. I even made a baby artichoke risotto, but I've never before attempted a Big One. But this week, I lost my artichoke virginity. And I could have used Artichokes for Dummies, so I've written an excerpt for you.

What to Expect When You're Expecting Stuffed Artichokes

-    This is going to take some time. Don't try to rush through the prep or you'll eat a bunch of prickers.
-    Don't expect to get through artichoke prep without a poke or two. It's a fricking thistle.
-    If you stick your finger down the middle of the artichoke, it will look like you grabbed a porcupine.
-    If you pull the leaves back too far, they will come off. Only do this if you WANT them to come off.
-    Don't think that a lot of stuffing is going to fit in those little tiny spaces between the leaves.
-    If you try to eat a whole leaf, you will need hours to chew and had better have a GI tract of steel.
-   To each an artichoke leaf, pull it off the heart and scrape the meat off the bottom half of the leaf with your teeth. This will create a big pile of inedbile hard leaves on your plate, but it's worth to get to the heart.

Fortunately, you're not alone in this. Saveur has a great pictorial on how to prep your artichoke, so I'm not going to go into it - my one-handed pictures are blurry at best. And while I would normally list a recipe here that I had adapted shamelessly, I was a little intimidated by these foreign prickly beasties. Instead, I'll just send you to this Epicurious recipe, which I followed with near-religious fervor. It's not too complicated and it's definitely worth the work. See?