Basil-Mint Sorbet

Nothing evokes the essence of summer like basil--you know that sudden wave of sunshine that washes over you in winter when you open a freezer bag of the pesto you made in August? This sorbet goes even further ... it's transporting, ambrosial; the mint and basil combine in a heavenly taste that opens eyes in surprise and conducts a symphony on the taste buds.

I discovered the recipe in Frances Mayes' admittedly hedonistic book about life in her Tuscan villa. I make it every time my friend Judy comes to visit from Maine. It's the kind of thing you need to eat with someone who also hears the music of the taste bud orchestra! Some people (you know who you are) refuse to try this dessert, saying it looks like pond scum. Their loss! More for us!

Depending on my mood and the state of the basil and mint plants, I sometimes greatly increase the amount of basil and mint. And sometimes I strain the blended herb liquid, but you don't need to.
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BASIL-MINT SORBET
Adapted from Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes

3/4 cup sugar
3 cups water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 cup mint leaves (or lots more)
1/2 cup basil leaves (or lots more)

Boil 1 cup water with the sugar for 5 minutes, stirring little if at all. Cool.

In blender, blend remaining two cups water with mint and basil leaves until thoroughly pureed. Add lemon juice and cooled sugar syrup, and chill well.

Freeze in ice cream freezer, or if you don't have one, use the ice-cube tray/repeated blendings method.

Serve in little bowls that you've put in the freezer for a while.

The sorbet is best made and frozen about 4 or 5 hours ahead of serving; long-term freezer storage hardens it.

Serves six or eight, depending on size of serving.

A Berry Good Strategy

It's easy to be overwhelmed at the farmer's market when you survey the beautiful and not inexpensive berries that draw you in with their aromatic scents and luscious colors, tempting you to buy. But if berries are a part of your life and you're not willing to pay even more for faded, odd-colored, corporate-frozen berries from the supermarket, simply gird yourself with a Silpat and a baking sheet, and stride confidently into the world of having your own local berries all winter long. You'll be glad you did.

Set aside the berries that you want to eat fresh, and prepare the others as if you were going to use them right away ... wash, stem, slice if desired. Drain the berries well, and spread them in one layer on a Silpat-lined, rimmed baking sheet. Set the sheet in the freezer, and when the berries are frozen, carefully and gently fold the Silpat sides up, and then the ends, to loosen the berries. When the berries are rolling around freely, gather the two long sides of the Silpat into a chute and guide the berries into a one-gallon freezer bag. Seal well, double bag if you'll be storing them a long time, and put the bag in the freezer.

The frozen berries will keep their shapes fairly well even when thawed, so you can use them for compote or cobblers, as well as for smoothies. I can't overemphasize the usefulness of a Silpat silicone baking liner. They're available at Ariel in Richland (they're open on Farmer's Market morning!), so do stop by and pick one up. You'll use it for lots of things, and will find yourself thinking up new uses for it, like I did with freezing berries!

The same technique works with all fresh fruits ... cherries, peaches, nectarines. Give your freezer a colorful collection of local, summer fruits that will cheer you in winter.

Joe's Special (And So Are You)

From Mark Bittman (and me) comes this variation on a classic dish. Brown up a pound of local ground beef along with some fresh chopped garlic (available in the Spring at farmer's markets) and local onion. For fun, chop up some baby bok choy that you bought at the farmer's market on a whim, and stir it in with the onion. Add a bag of fresh, local spinach, washed and snipped down with kitchen shears, and stir 'til it's cooked, then break about four local eggs into the mix and stir 'em in. Don't forget salt and pepper. I topped ours with my newest thrilling local find, smoked goat cheese from a local farmer. He calls it "Goat Colby."

Now, I'm the kind of person who puts eggs in bowls and beats them before adding them to a dish like this, but tonight I reformed. It's liberating! Just crack the four eggs open on top of the hot meat mixture, break the yolks with your spatula, and stir 'til everything's cooked.

Alongside local sugar snap peas so young you don't even need to string 'em, local radishes, and local strawberries for dessert, this Joe's Special is robust dish that makes a good warm-day meal because there's no oven involved. You can play with the ingredients endlessly, all summer long.

And you know what? This is another Entirely Local Meal. Bravo!

Easy Meal Ideas

This article came out in the New York times a few years ago, and I post it here because it exemplifies the style of cooking at which I am trying to become more adept: making a meal of the ingredients on hand.

I cut the article out and taped it to the inside of my pantry door, and sometimes I just stand there and read a few of the 101 ideas Bittman offers. Just a glance or two at it can put you in the frame of mind for creating satisfying, speedy meals, especially during the farmer's market season when your fridge might be (ahem) a little full of fresh, local produce.

By keeping certain staples in the fridge (cheeses, oils, nuts, eggs, olives, etc) and in your cupboards (pasta, canned salmon, soups, canned beans, and such), as well as some freezer basics like meat and fish, you can forget complex recipes and merely combine the parts into a whole. Next up for me is Idea #28, using my fresh, local eggs, Pat 'n Tam's ground beef and the Schreiber and Sons spinach and onions I got last week.

There's a time for complex recipes and for spending hours in the kitchen. But summer ain't it.

Management of Your Farmer's Market Booty

Okay, this is going to get a little personal. But if one takes the trouble to go to a farmer's market and stock up on fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts, and other wonderful stuff, it doesn't make sense to let ANY of it go to waste. Here are a couple of tricks to keep your wondrous goods rotating happily.

1) Keep a list of the fresh stuff you bring home from the market. Post it on your fridge. Gaze at the list for inspiration. Cook with your beautiful produce. Cross off stuff that you use. This way, your fresh produce will be used when it IS fresh, and will not become a sad, cast-out victim of Produce Neglect, producing guilt that you don't need.

2) Invest in clear storage containers, especially for refrigerated items. This way you can SEE what you have, and will be more likely to USE it. We are, after all, pretty simple creatures. See, reach, eat.

Classic cooking (Cordon Bleu, Culinary Institute of America, etc.) has as its main theme the age-old premise of respecting food and not wasting it. A good value to cultivate!

Arugula-Pecan Pasta with Local Flatiron Steak

Don't go thinking I'm inspired all the time. Last night we had scrambled eggs with leftover spinach in them, and toast. For which, of course, I am very grateful.

Still, I was ready for something with a little zing tonight, but couldn't seem to zero in on anything. It's always tempting to cave in and go out. But reading Cathy Erway's book is inspiring because she went without eating in a restaurant for TWO YEARS. I know Mr. Eating the Scenery prefers eating in, so I really try to make that happen.

When uninspired, I usually start tidying things up, and in so doing, I picked up the latest issue of Sunset magazine, which (!) had a page turned down on this recipe!

I had two bags of local arugula, and had picked up some flatiron steak from Pat 'n Tam's at the Pasco farmer's market a couple of weeks ago. Sunset called for walnuts in the pesto, but I was out of them so used pecans. And they used hangar steak and made a complex sauce for it. But I used up all my cooking mojo for today just making the pesto.

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ARUGULA-PECAN PASTA WITH LOCAL FLATIRON STEAK
Adapted from Sunset Magazine

When using arugula in salads, I usually tear out the big stems. But for pesto, you can leave them on! I always toss the pesto with only part of the pasta at first, and only mix in more if needed to get the pesto:pasta ratio just right.

1 pound dried pasta ... penne, farfalle, rotini ... no matter

2 bags (about 2 quarts sort-of-packed) arugula, washed and spun dry, and lightly snipped down with kitchen shears to reduce its volume
Grated peel of one lemon
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 medium cloves garlic
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

1/4 cup walnuts or pecans
3-4 ounces (about 3/4 cup) crumbled Oregon blue cheese, divided

Put pasta water on to heat. Cook pasta according to your taste.

In food processor, combine arugula, lemon peel, olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper. Blend until smooth and desired pesto texture is achieved. Add nuts and 1/2 cup of the blue cheese. Blend just until cheese and nuts are in small pieces.

Toss pesto with hot, drained pasta, and top with remaining crumbled blue cheese.

For the steak:

I simply broiled the flatiron steak about 8 inches from the broiler until it was browned, and turned it once, broiling again until medium rare when sliced. Salt and pepper was all it needed. This is the first Pat 'n Tam's steak I've had, and the flavor was excellent.

Olde English Seed Cake

For bedtime reading, the Miss Read books can't be beat. A deep calm comes over one upon opening one of her books at the end of the day. Quiet English villages in the Cotswolds ... cottage gardens, eccentric characters, and never a day without tea. When someone falls ill in Fairacre or Thrush Green, "lemon barley water" is produced, a restorative believed to help strengthen a weakened constitution. It's simply lemonade made with water in which barley has been cooked, sweetened with honey.

Seed cake is frequently offered at tea. In modern times, seed cake is merely a sponge cake with caraway or anise seeds added. It's still served at English teas. But its origins go back as far as the 1500's, when it was a yeasted, round cake. It's mentioned in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, its round shape said to represent a medieval shield known as the Buckler.

Years ago my mom and I made a round skillet bread with caraway seed in it, called "San Francisco Firehouse Bread." That memory, plus the intrigue of making a recipe with a history going back to an age when books had titles like Book of Cookrye and The English Huswife, prompted me to do a little research and create this cake of seeded exquisiteness. Not something we often bake with, seeds bring a unique flavor as well as a gritty crunch.

Step back in time ...

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OLDE ENGLISH SEED CAKE
Adapted from this website

I used a mixture of seeds; you can use all of one type if you wish, or a different mixture than mine. Make sure any mixture you use is a pleasing one.

1 package yeast
1/8 cup warm ale or water

1/2 cup (1 stick) organic butter
2/3 cup organic sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt

2 fresh, local eggs
2 teaspoons anise seeds
2 teaspoons caraway seeds
1/2 teaspoon cardamom seeds

1-1/2 cups regular flour
1 cup whole wheat flour

About 1-1/2 cups milk (I used some fresh, local buttermilk from this adventure!)

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Sprinkle yeast over ale or water in a small bowl.

Crush seeds lightly with a mortar and pestle if you have one.

In food processor, cream butter, sugar and salt until smooth. Add eggs, seeds, flours, yeast mixture, and 1 cup milk. Blend JUST until smooth. You should have a thick batter. If needed, add remaining 1/2 cup milk.

Pour batter into buttered 8-inch round cake pan. (I used a buttered 8-1/2 inch springform pan.) Bake 45 to 55 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool on rack for about 15 minutes before running knife around sides and turning cake out onto a plate.

Makes 8 servings.

First Richland Farmer's Market of 2010

Richland's Farmer's Market started its 2010 season today with vendors lining both sides of the Parkway ... almost as many as you see at the height of the season. This is a very popular market, I think because it's well organized, has a great variety of vendors, has a festive atmosphere with several food booths and often live music, and parking is easy.

The first photo above shows my CSA farmer's booth today ... I always stop there because so much of the produce is organic. And of course, delicious. If not for Schreiber and Sons, I wouldn't have had a Winter CSA to sign up for, and probably would never have begun this blog.

The second photo is from the very first Richland Market in 2006. The market opened in pouring rain that didn't let up for several hours. I was privileged to serve almost every week as "counter" for the Richland Market during its first year, tallying the number of customers who came through. It has been a joy to see the number of market customers increase impressively during subsequent years. I'm grateful to John and Tara Erben for their hard work and vision in bring this market to reality and keeping it fresh!

Here's to a great summer of Friday mornings at the Richland Market!

First Southridge (Kennewick) Farmer's Market

Today was the inaugural, kickoff, maiden voyage ... the very first Southridge Farmer's Market in Kennewick. The market will be open from 4:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Thursdays from now 'til October 21. A respectable number of vendors were present, with a good selection of your basic early-summer produce. This market has some pretty extreme potential for growth because of its location near densely populated areas. All in all, another excellent way to get fresh, local produce into your life!

Secrets of Rhubarb

The taste of rhubarb still thrills me as much as it did when we ate canned fruit all winter and gloried in this, the first "fruit" of spring. The ruby-red stalks have been available at the Pasco Farmer's Market this year, and I usually get around four pounds.

To the trimmed, sliced rhubarb, I add about two cups of water and 3/4 cup or so of agave syrup. Honey works well, too. Cook it up, stirring frequently and adding water if necessary, 'til the pieces are soft.

Rhubarb has an interesting affinity for basil; if you add some chopped basil after the rhubarb is cooked, it will create a delightful "mystery" flavor that people will try to place, usually unsuccessfully.

This year I learned that my trusty Wusthof kitchen shears do a fine job of slicing the stalks much more quickly than using a knife; the shears cut completely through the rhubarb's strings rather than having to put extra slicing effort into using a knife.

You can actually dice raw rhubarb up finely (1/4 inch or so) and bake it into muffins, pancakes and breads as you would raisins or cranberries. I am thinking about coming up with a rhubarb granola recipe.

Rhubarb is easy to grow once established, though it is a heavy feeder. I currently don't have a rhubarb patch but would like to!

Very Local Butter

You can't get much more local than your own kitchen. Until discovering Pure Eire Dairy, and learning that saturated fats have been much maligned and in fact are quite vital to our health, I hadn't thought too much about making my own butter, although I've been purchasing organic butter for some time, and ghee occasionally.

Because the healthiest butter is made from grass-fed cows' milk, and Pure Eire's bossies are grass fed, it seemed right and proper to produce butter with their cream.

It is tricky to describe the vast difference in taste of this butter from commercial butter. Have you ever been in a cow barn at milking time? Have you been near a cream separator either during operation or when it's being cleaned? I have. But if you have not, butter made with this cream will taste unusual to you. Its flavor is the essence of pure dairy cream.

I learned a few things for next time, and because of this butter's ethereal taste and health appeal, there will be a next time.
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VERY LOCAL BUTTER
Adapted from Fat byJennifer McLagan and also from this site.

1 pint (2 cups) local heavy cream from grass-fed cows
1/2 teaspoon salt (if desired)
1 quart ice water, with ice in it to keep it cold

Let the cream warm to room temperature. Pour into food processor and turn on. The cream will whip, then separate, and then the butter will seize and become a ball, leaving a milky liquid in the food processor bowl. Immediately stop the processor when the butter becomes a ball. Pour off the buttermilk through a fine sieve, and save for other uses (pancakes, cornbread, etc.). Return any pieces of butter that collect in the sieve to the food processor.

Now you are going to "wash" the butter to remove the remaining buttermilk from it. Pour about a cup of ice water onto the butter and process so that the butter mixes with the water and then separates into a ball again. Drain off the water through your sieve, discarding the water each time, and repeat this process until the water is fairly clear. It took four washings for me. Gather the butter up into a ball.

Now you want to remove any remaining water from your ball of butter. I must take issue with the directions that called for squeezing the water out by hand OR kneading the butter on a clean towel. I used both these processes, and they are incredibly messy, the butter sticks to your hands and to the towel, plus your hands will quickly melt the butter, making it stick even worse.

In the end, I used a dough scraper to keep scraping the butter up off the towel as I kneaded it. During the kneading, sprinkle the salt, if you are using it, over the butter and knead it in.

I persevered, but for next time I am going to be on the lookout for butter paddles, which our ancestors used and which I suspect have not been improved upon for generations. You simply circle the ball of butter around between the paddles, and the water runs out in the grooves.

The yield is about one cup of the best-tasting butter you've ever had.

Update: We don't use a lot of butter, so I was especially pleased that this homemade butter kept sweet and delicious for three weeks. That's because I "washed" it, to remove the buttermilk. You can use the butter just as it comes out of the food processor without removing the buttermilk with the water washes, but it will go sour quite fast. This butter is best on breads, toast, popcorn, and used for sauteeing fresh vegetables ... the taste of the butter is so good that you'll want to use it in ways that let you appreciate the flavor.

Spaghetti with Shrimp, Clams and Scallops

A while back I posted about our local Northwest Seafood Market, and last weekend I sought out their fresh clams and shrimp for a special birthday dinner. This recipe is from a lovely, lush cookbook called The Food of Italy, and just looking through it makes you want to rush into the kitchen and start cooking. The book's picture of this dish inspired my friend to comment how delicious and Italian it looked, so it seemed like destiny that she should have it for her birthday dinner!

And so her mother and I had great fun cooking this delectable dish. We made adjustments to the original because we both prefer a generous amount of sauce to a more spartan amount of pasta. As well, we omitted the squid tubes and baby octopus, and upped the quantity of other seafood.

For such an innocent-looking dish, it packs a lot of flavor from the saffron, garlic, and seafood. It's definitely a keeper, and quite suitable for special-occasion dinners!

This amount will serve about 12 people, but the recipe is easily halved.

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SPAGHETTI WITH SHRIMP, CLAMS AND SCALLOPS
Adapted from The Food of Italy

2 cups dry white wine
2 generous pinches of saffron threads

4 pounds clams
2 pounds shrimp, shelled and cleaned
1 pound scallops, cleaned

1-1/2 pounds dry spaghetti

5 tablespoons olive oil
6 garlic cloves, crushed or chopped
1 28-ounce can diced or crushed tomatoes, undrained
1 14-ounce can diced or crushed tomatoes, undrained
1 cup chopped parsley

Lemon wedges to serve

Put the wine and saffron in a bowl and allow to steep.

Clean clams, scrubbing if necessary. Rinse well and discard any that are broken or open and don't close when tapped on counter. Place clams in large pot with 1-1/2 cups water. Cover and turn heat to high, cooking for 2-3 minutes or until all clams open. Remove clams from liquid, and reserve liquid. Remove clams from shells, discarding any that don't open, and set clam meat aside.

Cook the pasta in a large pot of boiling water, timing it to be done when you are ready to mix it with the finished tomato/seafood mixture.

Heat olive oil in large Dutch oven (we used a 12-quart one) and add garlic and both cans of tomatoes, and cook, stirring, for a minute or so. Pour in the saffron-infused wine and the reserved clam liquid. (We only used about a half cup of the clam liquid, but that was just us.) Simmer until liquid is reduced by half. Add the shrimp and cook until all shrimp begin to turn pink, then add the clam meat and scallops, cooking and stirring occasionally until shrimp are thoroughly pink and scallops are opaque.

Stir in the parsley, and add the drained, cooked pasta and gently mix well. Turn out onto very large platter or into a large serving bowl. We dusted the top with grated Parmesan cheese, and very pretty it was. Garnish with lemon wedges or serve them separately.

Asparagus, Avocado and Arugula Salad

Last Wednesday's asparagus curry, which I made up, was very good. But before deciding to make it, I considered an avocado that I had in the fridge. (Yes, refrigerating avocados is a good thing. They ripen more slowly in there.)

Anyhoo, I really, really wanted to make a salad with the asparagus AND the avocado. Green, right? I was kind of in a monochromatic mood. And I adore the thrill of making something memorably tasty with just what I have on hand. But I just couldn't picture avocado and asparagus getting along with each other. I was pretty convinced that in the history of cooking, no one had combined them. So I turned away.

Little did I know that once again, I'd be shown that courageous cooking is the better way. The very next day, I stumbled across this book at our local Barnes and Noble, and there it was! The very salad I thought could not exist!

But it does.

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ASPARAGUS, AVOCADO AND ARUGULA SALAD
Adapted from The Art of Eating In by Cathy Erway

What a glorious triumph of farmer's market greenery. The original recipe called for watercress rather than arugula. They're both peppery, so either will do. I thought the lemon peel would add, too ... and it does. This is a rich-tasting, lemony, peppery salad that is worthy of a role in a special dinner.

1-1/2 pounds asparagus, tough ends trimmed, cut into 1-inch lengths
1 avocado, diced
3-4 spring onions, white and a little of the green parts, sliced
4 cups arugula, washed, spun and sliced

1 organic lemon

1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
Freshly ground pepper

Toss the asparagus into boiling water for a few minutes, until it's tender-crisp but still bright green. Drain and set aside.

Into a large bowl, grate the peel of the lemon. Then cut the lemon in half and juice it.

In a small bowl, toss the avocado thoroughly with 1 tablespoon of the lemon juice. This prevents the avocado getting brown.

Into the large bowl with the lemon peel, whisk the remaining lemon juice with the olive oil, salt and pepper. Add the asparagus and toss well, then add the arugula and onions and toss well. Lastly, add the avocado and toss lightly to mix.

Serves 6 to 8.

Update: Two days later, this salad is as attractive and delicious as when it was made. I attribute this to the step of mixing the avocado thoroughly with lemon juice. It didn't get even a little brown!

Lemon, Almond and Rosemary Cake

Crazy Water, Pickled Lemons is my go-to cookbook for lush, inspiring photographs and recipes. Whenever we have a lightning storm, I get out this cookbook ... because once I was reading it when a lightning storm with drenching rain struck, and somehow a full-circle connection was created between nature's majesty, me, and this book. It leans definitely to the Middle-Eastern, and ever since that last big storm we had a while back, I've been thinking about trying this cake. I used homemade sourdough bread that already had rosemary in it, organic lemons, organic sugar, and my luscious local eggs.

The author suggests serving it with berries, but my little patch of strawberries is just beginning to produce, so we augmented them with mango when it came time to partake. This cake has a wonderfully grainy texture, a sweet lemony tang, and an exotic, Middle-Eastern syrupy aspect, all infused with the woodsy essence of rosemary.

I know it's not health food, but it's soul food.

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LEMON, ALMOND AND ROSEMARY CAKE
Adapted from Crazy Water, Pickled Lemons by Diana Henry

For the cake:

2 ounces stale white bread (3/4 cup crumbs)
3-1/2 ounces (3/4 cup) blanched almonds (non-blanched work fine, too)
2 teaspoons rosemary leaves
3/4 cup sugar

Grated zest of 1 lemon
3/4 cup olive oil
4 local, free-range eggs

2 teaspoons baking powder

For the syrup:

Juice of 2 lemons
1/2 cup water
1/3 cup sugar
2 sprigs rosemary

Butter bottom and sides of an 8-1/2 inch springform pan. I think you could also use an 8-inch square Pyrex pan, or similar cake pan, if you butter it generously, flour it as well, and run a knife around the edge of the pan when releasing the baked cake.

In food processor, grind bread, almonds and rosemary as finely as possible. Add sugar, lemon zest, olive oil and eggs, and pulse as briefly as possible, just to blend. Add baking powder and pulse very briefly, just until until baking powder is incorporated.

Pour batter into prepared pan, put into a cold oven and turn oven on to 350 degrees. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until cake is brown and a toothpick inserted int he center comes out clean. Cool cake for 10 minutes, then turn it out onto a plate.

While cake is baking, make syrup. Combine all ingredients in a small saucepan and heat, stirring to dissolve sugar. Turn heat up and boil syrup for 5 minutes, then remove from heat. Leave rosemary in to infuse.

Pierce holes in the warm cake, and pour the syrup evenly over. Serve with berries, other fruit, yogurt, ice cream, or any other accompaniments that strike your fancy.

Makes 8 servings.

Green Curry of Asparagus, Spring Onion and Fresh Garlic

Although only two vegetable vendors were to be found at today's Pasco Farmer's Market, luscious spring onions, radishes, asparagus, and fresh garlic were on offer. All this greenness made me feel like making something green. Someone once told me that when you wear clothing that is all the same color, you feel calmer. I feel calmer when my ingredients match, too.

I'm really pretty excited about how good this dish turned out. You can see that the sauce would suit itself to a variety of other vegetables and meats. The garlic was so fresh that I just sliced the whole head without peeling.

If you don't have mint, use cilantro or basil, or just skip the herb. For fish sauce, you could use soy sauce, but it won't have the same flavor, of course. I didn't have any limes, but if I had, I'd have squeezed a bit of lime juice over everything.

And if you don't have free-range chicken, deranged chicken will do.

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GREEN CURRY OF ASPARAGUS, SPRING ONION AND FRESH GARLIC

1-1/2 pounds asparagus, trimmed and cut into 2-inch lengths
4 large (2-inch diameter) spring onions, white and light green parts only, sliced
1 head very fresh garlic, sliced (or a couple of garlic cloves, chopped)
3 cups local, free-range chicken, boned, cooked and cut into 1-inch chunks

1 small (6-ounce or so) can of coconut milk
1 tablespoon Thai green curry paste
1 tablespoon Thai fish sauce
1 tablespoon sucanat or brown sugar

1/3 cup or so fresh mint, chopped

In large skillet, pour coconut milk and whisk 'til smooth. Turn heat to medium, and add curry paste. Cook, whisking, 'til sauce is hot and bubbly. Add fish sauce and sucanat, cook another minute or two.

Toss in all the veggies and the chicken pieces and cook, stirring often, until the veggies are crisp-tender. Asparagus should still be bright green.

Mix in mint and serve with rice or couscous.

This makes a light but flavorful sauce for everyday meals; if you want a richer dish, and you'd like the vegetables to be really saucy (like in a Thai restaurant), double the sauce recipe.

Makes 4 very hearty servings.

Food Fads: A Mini-Discussion

Food Fad #1: Dessert Shooters

Once in a while I feel strongly enough about a food fad to speak up. These creepy little things have shown up in many major restaurants, and are being hailed all over creation as something "you gotta try!"

Now, I know there's lots of craziness out there in the world, and people are irrational fairly consistently, and there's no accounting for taste. But dessert shooters? If you want a small dessert, why not plate it attractively so you can enjoy looking at it (horizontally) and enjoy its unique shape and texture? Why shove it into a glass cylinder, making it a generic, stuffed-test-tube looking kind of thing?

You might say, "Becky, did you not just blog quinoa pudding and strawberry-rhubarb trifle? And are they not served in glass cylinders?" Of course! Puddings and trifles are SUPPOSED to be served like that. There's some integrity there. And they're accessible, not served in beakers, for goodness' sake!

My point is that in many cases these imposter desserts are called by the same name as real desserts--key lime pie, or apple crisp, for example. Key lime pie is PIE, people! Served in a SLICE, a TRIANGLE, a SHAPE, for heaven's sake, that you can recognize as a portion of something that was created whole as a dessert.

And apple crisp ... even a small portion of apple crisp ... is vastly more attractive on a plate, with a dab of ice cream or whipped cream nestling alongside it, with maybe a drifting of cinnamon over the plate so you can admire it for a bit before tasting it. Why should your serving of apple crisp look like something from your high school science lab?

It has to be said ... dessert shooters look like the cooks have just shoved leftover dessert components (and who knows what all bits of things they found in the back of the cooler) into those little glasses and are trying to pass them off as something creative!

I predict that dessert shooters will totally disappear within two years, and sanity in the dessert world will be restored.

Mediterranean Orzo Salad with Fresh Greens

I do love a sturdy salad. This one travels well, and if you take it to a potluck, you might as well take copies of the recipe with you. People are going to ask.

The recipe is from an old Cooking Light magazine now long lost. I usually stick pretty close to the original on this one, but I did substitute fresh sliced farmer's market arugula for some of the spinach, and local green onions for the red onion. And I added garlic and oregano. I usually add more spinach than it calls for; it seems to be absorbed in the salad, and I love upping the nutrient count!

Reminds me of our old family joke ... whenever Mom says "I made it just like the recipe called for," we wait a beat and say, "Except ..." Sure enough, almost always she's made some kind of substitution. But that's creative cooking!

The green onions were from my friend Elizabeth, and the tomatoes I used were grown by my Dad and dried by my Mom. How grateful I am for the sharing of bounty.

You'll want to at least double this recipe; the salad keeps well, but you probably won't have any left.

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MEDITERRANEAN ORZO SALAD WITH FRESH GREENS
From Cooking Light magazine, adapted as described above

1 cup uncooked orzo pasta

1 small clove garlic, minced
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 cup oil-packed sun-dried tomatoes,* drained and chopped
1/4 cup chopped red onion or sliced green onion

1 6-ounce jar marinated artichoke hearts, undrained
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 cup pitted kalamata olives, halved

2 cups (or more to taste) baby spinach or arugula, or a mixture, chopped
3/4 cup feta cheese, crumbled

Cook orzo according to package directions. Drain, rinse with cold water, and place in a large bowl. Stir in the garlic, oregano, tomatoes, and onions.

Drain artichoke hearts and RESERVE THE MARINADE. Cut artichokes into quarters or eighths as you prefer. Place marinade in a small bowl, and the artichokes in another bowl.

To the artichokes, add the kalamata olives.

To the marinade, add salt and pepper and whisk well.

Pour marinade over orzo mixture and stir well. Add feta cheese and spinach, and stir well. Add olives and artichokes and mix gently.

Makes six servings.

*Or use fresh tomatoes, or dried tomatoes that you have soaked and to which you add a little olive oil. If you use oil-packed tomatoes, they may be seasoned already; adjust garlic and oregano accordingly.

Coconut Quinoa Pudding with Rhubarb

Curious about using the new coconut beverage product for cooking, I decided to take the plunge and try this recipe using it. This is not coconut milk like you'd find in cans, but a beverage made for use like milk.

Quinoa is really quite a nutritious grain, high in protein, and tasty besides. This pudding is really easy to make, and you could of course use any fruit of the season.

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COCONUT QUINOA PUDDING WITH RHUBARB
Adapted from this recipe

3-1/2 cups coconut beverage (I used vanilla; if you use unsweetened, you may need more sucanat)
1 cup quinoa, rinsed and drained
1 tablespoon sucanat
A pinch of salt

Fresh cooked rhubarb from the farmer's market

In medium-sized, sturdy saucepan, bring coconut milk to a simmer over medium heat. Add quinoa and sucanat, stir, and reduce heat to low. Simmer 20 to 30 minutes, stirring frequently as the quinoa absorbs the liquid. Add 1/2 cup coconut milk if needed to thin the pudding. When the pudding reaches the texture you desire, remove from heat and cool, or serve warm. It will thicken on standing and when you refrigerate it.

Layer however you please with the rhubarb, or just top a bowl of the pudding with the fruit.

Makes 4 generous servings or 6 stingy ones

Chai-Soaked Shrimp with Spring Onions

These days, when I see something languishing in the fridge like the partially-used box of Pacific Chai tea concentrate, I begin to wonder what I can make with it. How about a marinade for .... shrimp? Googling "chai shrimp" turned up a recipe which, of course, I altered significantly.

Don't you think "soaked" sounds more saturated and luscious than "marinated?"

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CHAI-SOAKED SHRIMP WITH SPRING ONIONS
Adapted from this recipe

About 20 medium shrimp (can be frozen)

2 cups chai tea concentrate
1 tablespoon chopped ginger
2 teaspoons chopped garlic
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon Thai chili paste

1 tablespoon coconut or vegetable oil

A generous amount of sliced spring onions (I added a lot more after the photo was taken)

Basmati rice for serving

Mix the soaking ingredients in a small bowl or flat dish that will just barely hold the shrimp. Submerge the shrimp in the soak and refrigerate for a few hours, turning occasionally. If shrimp are frozen, you can leave the bowl out at room temperature.

Remove the shrimp to another bowl, and pour the soaking liquid into a medium-sized skillet. Over medium-high heat, boil the liquid down to about a cup or so. Add the coconut oil and toss in the shrimp and cook quickly, turning, until they all turn pink. You have to look closely, because the marinade will make the shrimp brown, too. Don't overcook them or they'll be tough.

Scatter the spring onions over the shrimp, stir briefly, and serve with basmati rice, spooning the sauce over.

Makes 4 abstimious servings and 2 very hearty ones

Slaw of Coles with Tarragon and Mint

The other day I was reading how plants in the cole family contain important nutrients for humans. As I looked over the list of coles, I was amazed to see 16 plants, most of which will be available in abundance at our farmer's markets this summer and fall. At any given moment, I probably have three or four coles in my fridge. It struck me that combined in a "found" salad, they would probably be very tasty!

The coles are: kale, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, collards, bok choy, tatsoi, chard, cauliflower, broccoli, turnips, rutabagas, radishes, horseradish, mustard, arugula, and watercress.

By now you probably realize that I am trying to develop and promote the technique of getting maximum benefit from seasonal, market-fresh, local ingredients. To do that, a wonderful shopping technique to use is to buy what looks fresh and good to you at the market, then figure out what to do with it. That way, all your ingredients will appeal to you and be so very fresh that you can't, as I've said so many times before, go wrong.

The habit of buying the freshest ingredients and creating dishes will eventually provide you with a fistful of favorite recipes, and you will begin to look at a motley collection of vegetables and see, instead, a salad, side dish, soup, or other tasty combination.

The mint was added when I looked out the window and saw that my pot of mint had started to sprout.

This recipe makes a very light slaw with a delicate tarragon and mint flavor. It's a good accompaniment to a substantial main dish. If you'd like the slaw to be heartier, stir in a tablespoon of Dijon, an extra tablespoon of olive oil, and a little honey. You can also use the creamy dressing from this salad (adjust amounts to suit the volume of your greens) or go Oriental by adding fresh ginger and garlic.

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SLAW OF COLES WITH TARRAGON AND MINT

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon salt
A grind of pepper

2 cups shredded cabbage
2 cups sliced arugula
1 bunch sliced radishes
1 tablespoon chopped mint
1 tablespoon chopped tarragon

Whisk the olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper thoroughly in a large bowl. Toss in the coles and herbs and mix well. Refrigerate for an hour or so before serving.

Makes 6 hearty servings.