Have a few summer cucumbers lingering in the fridge? Put them to good use by juicing them for refreshing cocktails or family-friendly mocktails.
Posts with tag cucumber
Beekman 1802 - Braised Cucumbers
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| Braised cucumbers. Photo: Brent Ridge, Beekman 1802. |
By Brent Ridge with Sandy Gluck
Like many people who love food (and watching cooking shows on TV), I plopped myself down in a cool theater during last week's heat wave to watch Meryl Streep expertly channel Julia Child.
What stuck with me after leaving the theater was not Streep's pitch-perfect accent, but the very brief mention of a recipe for braised cucumbers.
It is quite possible that my brain latched onto this because at the very moment I was having a conundrum with what to do with all the cucumbers we've been blessed with from the heirloom garden this year (after a disastrous beetle infestation in 2008).
Our heirloom cukes and an amazing recipe after the jump.
Cukes, Chardonnay and Chocolate - The Portland Press Herald in 60 Seconds
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| Basket of cucumbers. Photo: La Grande Farmers' Market, Flickr |
- When it's just too darned hot to cook, a cucumber dish can save the day.
- Wine retailers offer a dozen thirst-quenching vino suggestions, including a 2008 Star Tree Chardonnay.
- Maine's Migis Lodge offers cuisine that treads the line between elegant and casual.
- How to take a Mexican Bean and Rice Salad and lower its fat.
- We'll never be able to resist eating out now that restaurants have started tweeting about all their tasty fare on Twitter.
- Dispatches discovers a Chili Fest, an all-you-can-eat chocolate buffet, centennial farming and a shore dinner.
Cuke Crooks Thwart Aussie Police
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Twelve separate cucumber thefts have put Australian police in a pickle.
According to ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), cucumber capers have targeted market farmers in Adelaide over the past three months, stealing more than $10,000 worth of the popular vegetable.
"It's certainly a unique theft," Chief Inspector Kym Zander told ABC.
Few leads are reported at this point, but police are speculating as to all possible motives, including the case of a jealous farmer.
"We're looking at the possibility that it may be a grower that's had a failed crop and he's substituting through theft," Zander said.
Police do believe the timing of the thefts shows the thieves are in the know.
"Somebody has the knowledge that cucumbers are being picked at the appropriate time, they're being stored in boxes, buckets or bags -- and overnight the thefts are occurring," Zander tells ABC News reporter Pete McDonald.
Even if there was a lead, Zander admits it is hard to determine which cucumbers are the stolen ones.
Embezzled cukes could be sold right under investigator's noses at local grocery stores and markets, as there is no way to detect a cucumber's origin.
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| Turkish Cucumbers. Photo: beautifulcataya, Flickr |
According to ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), cucumber capers have targeted market farmers in Adelaide over the past three months, stealing more than $10,000 worth of the popular vegetable.
"It's certainly a unique theft," Chief Inspector Kym Zander told ABC.
Few leads are reported at this point, but police are speculating as to all possible motives, including the case of a jealous farmer.
"We're looking at the possibility that it may be a grower that's had a failed crop and he's substituting through theft," Zander said.
Police do believe the timing of the thefts shows the thieves are in the know.
"Somebody has the knowledge that cucumbers are being picked at the appropriate time, they're being stored in boxes, buckets or bags -- and overnight the thefts are occurring," Zander tells ABC News reporter Pete McDonald.
Even if there was a lead, Zander admits it is hard to determine which cucumbers are the stolen ones.
Embezzled cukes could be sold right under investigator's noses at local grocery stores and markets, as there is no way to detect a cucumber's origin.
Tiny Melons - Pepquinos - Coming to America
The pepquiños are coming, the pepquiños are coming.
Hot off the news that it's now tiny melon season in Britain, the producers of what may just be the world's only bite-sized melon -- the pepquiño -- say they're growing these grape-size fruits on New York's Long Island.
"It's already in America, but very, very small," Nicolas Mazard, the U.S. manager of Koppert Cress, told Slashfood Thursday. "So it will be ready this summer."
Learn how to eat these 3/4-inch fruits after the jump.
Continue reading Tiny Melons - Pepquinos - Coming to America
Drive My Car - Box Lunch
For your lunchtime pleasure, I'm presenting a series of my favorite bento boxes. Bento are Japanese home-prepared meals served in special boxes, usually eaten for lunch at work or school. These days, bento enthusiasts from all over the world share their creations on Flickr.
I'm loving this star-themed bento, thrown together from fridge leftovers, from Catdraco on the Live Journal bento site. We've got cukes with stars cut out of the center, filled with same-shaped sweet potatos. The noodles are rice vermicelli, and there are tofu cubes with soy and sesame oil. The car is a hard-boiled egg.
Spruce and cucumber: Bringing out the Rogue in gin
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When I was a teenager, George Orwell's 1984 was my favorite book, both for its writing, which I thought was superb, and for its depressing viewpoint, which beautifully dovetailed with my own adolescent angst. One of my favorite parts was Orwell's description of the effects of "Victory Gin," the official hard liquor of English Socialism:Instantly his face turned scarlet and the water ran out of his eyes. The stuff was like nitric acid, and moreover, in swallowing it one had the sensation of being hit on the back of the head with a rubber club. The next moment, however, the burning in his belly died down and the world began to look more cheerful.
When I first tried cheap tequila, I came to the conclusion that it was Orwell's famed Victory Gin. Oily, hard to swallow, and packing a wallop, it was also among the most popular tipples in the mid 1980's, far outstripping gin, which seemed pale and weak by comparison. If tequila was a hard whack with a rubber club, gin was a sip of chilled perfume.
Continue reading Spruce and cucumber: Bringing out the Rogue in gin
Box Lunch: Stars and hearts
For your lunchtime pleasure, I'm presenting a series of my favorite bento boxes. Bento are Japanese home-prepared meals served in special boxes, usually eaten for lunch at work or school. These days, bento enthusiasts from all over the world share their creations on Flickr.
Today's bento, from aJ Guzmen, features vegetarian chicken nuggets prettied up with some cheese cut outs in the shapes of hearts and tulips. The plastic 'bears' container is filled with honey mustard sauce for dipping. Above, a simple green salad is cute-ified with cucumber stars.
Box Lunch: Spa bento
For your lunchtime pleasure, I'm presenting a series of my favorite bento boxes. Bento are Japanese home-prepared meals served in special boxes, usually eaten for lunch at work or school. The boxes can range from austere lacquered trays to multi-tiered Hello Kitty confections of neon pink plastic. The meals themselves are anything from rice and leftovers to elaborate themed affairs of Pikachu-shaped dumplings with sesame seed eyes and carved radish trees. These days, bento enthusiasts from all over the world share their creations on Flickr.
Today's featured bento is an impressive spa-themed box from Sakurako Kitsa. The mud-masked face of our turbaned spa lady is made from a turkey slice slathered in green-dyed mayonnaise. Her turban and robe are made from white cheese with fruit leather trim, and she wears diamond-shaped squirts of canned cheese for earrings. Wow!
A transcendent summer tomato salad
One of the dishes I look forward to making when summer rolls around is the tomato salad you see above. It's nothing particularly special, just some chopped tomato (I use whatever I have on hand that is ripe, this time it was a bunch of sweet grape tomatoes) tossed with some roughly minced onion (I like red, but you can use whatever you have around) and some shredded basil. It gets dressed with salt, pepper and a glug of olive oil. And that's it.
The thing is that when you let this salad stand around for half an hour or so before serving, it becomes something far greater than just a collection of modest ingredients. The salt draws the liquid out of the tomatoes, which blends with the oil, creating a heavenly dressing. The basil softens and releases fragrant oils, which gently permeates the other ingredients. I can not possibly begin to describe how good it tastes.
Another nice thing about this salad, is that while it is wonderfully simple, it can also be elevated. Sometimes I'll add some cubed cucumber to it for added crunch, along with some small, halved mozzarella balls. It also takes to homemade croutons really nicely. If that's too much work for a simple meal, just grab a hunk of bread to mop of all the juices that will be left at the bottom of the bowl.
The one problem with this dish is that you can only make it during the summer, when tomatoes are ripe. It is bland and unexciting when made with those pale pink orbs that imitate tomatoes during the rest of the year. So do yourself a favor and make it when tomatoes are in season and your basil plant is growing like a weed. And enjoy a perfect summer dish.
Look of Love: Cucumbers
Is that a cucumber in your market totebag or are you just happy to see me?
I would say that more so than any of the other phallic foods, the straighter, thicker cucumber is probably the most, in my humble opinion of course, accurate. However, shape and size aren't the only things that matter when it comes to turning on a woman with a cucumber. Aside from its phallic shape, the scent of cucumbers is believed to stimulate women by increasing blood flow to the vagina.
That must be why so many of us love those cucumber melon scented bath products!
Gin Notes: Hendrick's Gin
Hendrick's Gin is 44% abv. / 88 proof and is distilled in Scotland. I tasted Hendrick's for the first time around 7-8 years or more ago when I stopped by the New Hampshire state liquor store on my way to vacation in Maine. What attracted my attention was the same thing that everyone else in the world notices about Hendrick's. The squat, very dark brown that it's almost black, apothecary style bottle. That and then I noticed the price. It was on sale ridiculously cheap because it had just made it onto the shelves and was being first introduced. I had heard of it just recently and been wanting to try it and at half the normal price this was a steal. So I bought a bottle and figured that if it was good I could pick up a few more on sale when I headed back to NY, something which I later did.The aroma is quite big, with a strong hit of juniper, followed closely by its star ingredients out of its various botanicals; cucumber and rose. The sharp, piney scent grabs you first but is quickly mellowed by the sweet, vegetal cucumber bottom notes and floral rose top notes. Then as it warms and opens up you get faint layers of spices coming in to play.
The taste is a medium juniper, again mellowed by the cucumber, and perked up with the rose petals. It is a soft and smooth gin, coating your mouth and tongue in soft, aromatic warmth, feeling sort of like a mouthful of warm, freshly made English custard. The mouth feel is very comforting and that softness of warm custard just jumps into my head. After the first hit of flavors you then get hints of citrus and herbs, and a very mild note of spearmint and rich chocolate and coffee. It has a long finish with semi-sweet layers of flavors following each other through your palate. The end is dry and aromatic and stays with you for several minutes.
Over the years I have had Hendrick's many times because it was one of the more easily available premium gins to locate, and helped start the trend of the new styles of gin. The first year or so they had some inconsistency with the product. Three bottles in a row would be excellent, then the fourth would taste like chemicals and benzene. Those issues were cleared up and they seem to be producing a consistently good product. This is a fine sipping gin, and if used in a martini you should make it very dry.
Yellow beans fulfill their destiny in a summery salad
Until 3:30 pm yesterday, I had had a colander of yellow string beans sitting on my counter since Tuesday evening. Every time I walked into the kitchen, I'd look at them and send them a little unspoken promise that soon I'd turn them into something wonderful. Yesterday afternoon, I decided that they'd been patient long enough. I fired up a pot of water and gave them a quick blanch. I ran them under cool water to stop the cooking and returned them to their colander home, but this time only long enough to run to my local Trader Joe's in order to pick up a few things for the salad I was imagining.
At TJ's, I grabbed a container of perlini (the tiny ones) mozzarella balls, some fresh basil and a couple of ears of corn. I brought it all home, pulled out a few ingredients I already had, did a little chopping and threw everything together. When it was all done, it tasted like I had captured summer.
photo by Marisa McClellan
Continue reading Yellow beans fulfill their destiny in a summery salad
Pepsi Ice Cucumber hits shelves in Japan
One could scarcely call a pale-green soft drink Pepsi. Nonetheless, here it is. Pepsi Ice Cucumber is an actual product, not a parody along the lines of Beef Twinkies. This bizarre beverage went on sale this week in Japan. As with many new products that experiment with flavors, it's only available for a limited time. I've savored sake with slivers of cucumber in it, but this green concoction strikes me as some sort of Zimalike mutant. While I'd love to think that Pepsi limited the supply of this new creation to boost future sales, after reading some reactions from bloggers in Japan, I'm not so sure. Japan Probe notes that the label describes the drink as a combination of cucumber and cola, but concludes that it has very little cola flavor. The blogger goes on to say that after the first few intriguing sips, the artificial cucumber renders it nasty. Japan Probe also has a post of some YouTube reactions to Pepsi Ice Cucumber. One fellow said it has a "green flavor, kind of like Satan's in my mouth." Mmm ... devil cola.
Gin Notes: Martin Miller's Reformed London Dry Gin
Martin Miller's Reformed London Dry Gin is 40%abv/80proof. It comes in a unusual six sided bottle with a curved back which has a map of the North Atlantic on it. I don't know what they mean by "Reformed" so I went to their website to find out, but it is down until 12/06/2006. Maybe we can find out then. The gin is distilled in a old copper pot still that has been in use for well over a century, making Miller's a single batch at a time. The botanicals are juniper, cinnamon, cassia, iris, licorice, orange peel, coriander seed, angelica seed, and nutmeg among others including one special secret ingredient that supposedly isn't even known by the master distiller. More on the secret ingredient later. The 92% alcohol gin is then shipped off to Iceland where it is cut with pure glacier fed spring water down to either 40%abd/80proof or a higher octane version called Martin Miller's Westbourne Strength Gin at 45.2%abv/90.4proof. I only tried the 80proof version.The aroma is soft and creamy, hints of juniper, spice, and cucumber. The taste is extremely soft, smooth, and creamy with an elegant and surprising taste. Besides the normal notes of juniper, herbs and spices, and floral notes there was a strong presence of cucumber. So much so that I felt like I was lying in a cucumber patch in the summer sun and noshing on fresh picked cukes while sipping the gin. I have to think that cucumber must be the secret ingredient since I have never tasted such a strong essence of cucumber before.
Continue reading Gin Notes: Martin Miller's Reformed London Dry Gin
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