Boiling broccoli.
It's just bad, and wrong. I know lots of people who don't like broccoli, and when I ask why it's usually because that's the only / main way they've had it. For me it's the opposite, I love broccoli, it's my favorite vegetable.
Acceptable methods of preparation, in descending order:
- pan-fried, hard. High heat, add a good oil and immediately follow with roughly chopped (e.g. halve the large "flowers") broccoli so the oil doesn't burn. It will sizzle and crack like crazy for a couple of minutes. In the end, you should have brown-almost-black, caramelized flowers/stems, that are still very crisp on the inside. If you want to make a sauce, set aside or make simultaneously and only combine towards the end, so you don't cook the broccoli until soft after frying.
- oven-roasted. High heat, again in the oven until almost blackened in spots. It's almost, but not quite as good as pan-fried, but that seems to be common with oven-roasting. You likely loose a lot of the inner crispness. But, no oil spritzes.
- blanched, shortly. IDK why you'd ever really want this, unless it's to make the color pop. Way worse than oven roasted, way better than cooked or steamed.
Note this only applies to fresh broccoli, the frozen stuff is unsalvageable.