From Trash to Table: Cucumber Basil Cooler

As I mentioned earlier in this growing season, we planted cucumbers for the first time in our small urban garden. Our prolific vines have kept us in cucumber salads, pickles, and Tzitki sauce for months. My one miscalculation in all of this was our purchase of a vegetable share from Harvest Moon Farms, who also have had extremely prolific vines.

While cucumbers are a favorite of both me and Little Locathor, we've had a hard time keeping up. I resurrected my grandmother's vinegary cucumber salad, created one of my own, and even cooked them in a stir-fry (recipe coming soon). Nevertheless, every time I think I've cleared my fridge of them all, another appears on the vine, or reveals itself from its hiding place in the crisper.

This second category has posed a greater problem, as at this point, they are certainly not at their peak only one step away from the compost heap. Taking my own trash to table challenge, I set out on a quest to find a way to use up wrinkly, soft cucumbers. Pulling out my slightly dusty veggie juicer, I extracted the pale green liquid from the overripe solids. What I've learned in this bumper year for cucumbers, the juice can be used in a number of recipes: for cooking couscous, a vegetarian risotto, or a poaching liquid for salmon or chicken. My favorite, however, is a brunch time cocktail that we've named the Fuzzy Pickle.

The Fuzzy Pickle
Serves 2

2 cups cucumber juice
8 leaves of basil
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
1 jigger vodka
seltzer water and ice

Muddle the basil and sugar together in a mortar and pestle. Scrape the mixture into a cocktail shaker, add juice, vodka and ice. Shake the mixture and strain into a large glass over ice. Top off the glass with seltzer water. Garnish with a cucumber or fresh herbs (the oregano blossoms in my garden were too beautiful to resist).

Easy as Pie: Rasperry-Rhubarb Pie

In scanning through Twitter, I recall a recent blog post, which suggested that farmers' markets can reduce stress. In all due respect, despite my love of them, I do not agree. While farmers' markets have their pastoral qualities and a convivial atmosphere, there's something rather dizzying about them, especially at the height of the season. A dozen different shapes and types of eggplants, squash, beans, and greens, I want to buy them all. What's for dinner is never a simple question for a farmers' market shopper. This can be particularly dangerous for market newbies. Who hasn't overbought at one time or another during summer's zenith?

In contrast, there's something so comforting about my CSA share. I love it not only because I get a manageable amount of certified organic produce, but also because I know that I'm eating exactly what I should. So for example, this weekend, we had good friends of ours over for dinner. Ordinarily, during the market season, I agonize over my menus - there's so much available and so many recipes to try. It could take me takes me hours to create one that seemed to make sense, one that I would change almost the instant, I stepped into the circle of market tents. This year, my menu was circumscribed by the box I'd picked up earlier in the week.

At first, when I opened it up to find a few stalks of rhubarb, I groaned. Believe me, we ate our fair share of it, at the end of May, in savory and sweet dishes. Plus, I've got bags of it packed away in freezer bags for the leaner months. But then I remembered the many recipes I've seen partnering rhubarb and raspberries - two ingredients I've never found together at the market. Pulling up my easy and stress-free pie crust recipe. I mixed, rolled, and baked my garnet-shaded pie over the course of an afternoon.

Raspberry-Rhubarb Pie
Serves 8

2 ½ cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
2 sticks unsalted butter, cut into small pieces, chilled
¼ - ½ cup ice water
3 cups fresh or frozen raspberries
3 cups sliced fresh or frozen rhubarb (1/2-inch thick)
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

Mix together the flour, salt, and sugar in the bowl of a food processor. Add butter and process until the mixture is sandy. Pour in the water through the feed tube, while pulsing. Pulse until the mixture just starts to hold together. Line a medium bowl loosely with plastic wrap. If you have a scale, measure 10 ounces of dough into it and wrap up the dough pressing it into a flat disc. Repeat with remaining dough. Chill for an hour. A half hour after you put it into chill, preheat the oven to 400 F. If you leave it in for longer, you'll have to let it soften outside of the fridge for a little while to make it pliable. Roll the larger disc to a 1/4-1/8-inch thick. Fit it into a 9-inch pie plate. Trim and crimp the edges. Prick the dough with a fork. Cover with aluminum foil and weight with dried beans or pie weights. Bake for 15-20 minutes. Remove the foil and weights and let cool. Increase the heat to 425 F.

Combine the raspberries, rhubarb, sugar, and salt. Scrape into the cooled crust. Roll out the remaining crust to 1/8-inch thick and cut into 1/4-inch slices. Weave into a lattice and seal at the edges. Brush with egg wash (1 egg yolk - 1 tablespoon milk).
Return to the oven and bake for 1 hour.

Cool and serve, preferably the same day.

A Single Ear of Corn: Avocado-Corn Salsa

Despite a bad experience a few years back with another farm, we joined a CSA (community supported agriculture) this summer. Each week we get a half share from Harvest Moon Farms, a certified organic farm in Viroqua, Wisconsin, owned by my friends, Jenny and Bob Borchadt. Pristine in quality and generally diverse in its contents, the Borchadt’s know how to please their customers. We pick it up every Friday at Lush, a wine store just a few blocks away, anxiously awaiting our weekly bounty.

This week’s share we received a bunch of kale, a handful of rhubarb, a few celery stalks, green beans, red potatoes, mucho cucumbers, two zucchini and one ear of corn. Yes, you heard me, a single ear of corn. For my Midwestern born and raised husband, this was a sore disappointment. Then I reminded him of one of our favorite summer recipes: Avocado-Corn Salsa. One ear of corn will go pretty far on our table tomorrow night.

Avocado-Corn Salsa
Serves 4

1 ear corn
1 avocado
¼ medium red onion, cut into ¼-inch dice
¼ Serrano chile, seeded and finely chopped
2 tablespoons cilantro, finely chopped
½ lime, juiced
Kosher salt to taste

Shuck corn and remove the kernels. Toast the corn in a dry, medium-size skillet over medium heat until tender, approximately 5 minutes. Halve and pit avocadoes. Cut into ¼-inch dice. Mix together avocadoes, corn, white onion, Serrano chile, cilantro, and lime juice in a small bowl. Season with kosher salt and serve immediately.