Green Gazpacho
Green is my favorite color; every shade and hue. It’s also my favorite color for vegetables-I love ALL the greens! As the heat continues on our beautiful island, I’ve taken advantage of the beautiful produce from our island farms, Moor’s End and Bartlett’s, and spun together this green gazpacho, which I serve alongside a delightfully delicious grilled cheese number (Pain D’Avignon French sandwich bread, arugula pesto, homemade aioli, aged Gouda, and farm tomatoes). The acidic, bright and chilly soup is a great foil to that umami bomb of a sandwich.
I don’t know how I’d be able to function without my trusty Vitamix. I’ve become so reliant on it for so many things, especially quick soups. This one is easy, beautiful and delicious. If you have a spare 20 minutes, get yourself moving and make some. Fancy it up in a special bowl or drink it from an old jelly jar, and then tell me how you liked it.
Serves 6
Ingredients
1 bunch of scallions, roughly chopped
1 green pepper, roughly chopped
1 large English cucumber, peeled, seeded and roughly chopped
1 clove garlic clove
1 t cumin
1 t smoked paprika
1/2 t salt
1 C Chicken or Vegetable Stock or Water
3 big handfuls of watercress, spinach, or arugula (or a combo)
1/2 bunch of parsley, minced
4 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
Either Greek yogurt to swirl or toasted pumpkin seeds to sprinkle on top
Method
Combine the first seven ingredients in a strong blender. Pulse a bunch of times until everything is smooth. Add about a cup of water or stock and pulse again a few times.
Add the greens, parsley, olive oil and vinegar. Blend until smooth and thin a bit if necessary. Taste for salt and refrigerate until chilled (or pour into a bowl within a bowl of ice cubes to speed up the process.
Refrigerate until very cold.
Serve and swirl with yogurt, or sprinkle with seeds, or go crazy and do both!
New Tricks and Watermelon Tomato Salad
In the last year, I’ve become a great fan of the Instagram. At the urging of the young people in my life, I signed up around this time last year and have really grown to love the platform for sharing and showcasing my food and travels. Today, I took a plunge and signed up to do that magical trick, where it says “Link to recipe in profile” (you know what I’m talking about!). This will be my first post using that magic!
First step is a perfect watermelon!
Nantucket is known for her cool ocean breezes and beautiful summer weather (yes, she is a she!). As someone who grew up here, I’ll tell you that many summer days can also be chilly, windy, foggy, wet, grey and occasionally hot and muggy. Yes, muggy. That’s where we were at last week, when I decided to take the ubiquitous watermelon/tomato salad route for my client.
it felt like I was traveling back to 1998, making this little number, but the tomatoes at Bartlett’s Farm are beauteous, although still grown in their hothouses, due to the crappy winter and spring we had here. Watermelon must be seedless! The feta should be the best you can afford (I love the one from Cricket Creek Farm) and the mint is mintier when freshly picked out of a garden.
The Mise en Place is on point here...
This salad is all about the dice (small and uniform), the vinegar (something with a little depth), and the temperature (chilly!). I’m trying to get better at this recipe writing stuff, so here it goes...
Ingredients
For this dish which fed 4-6 people happily, I used:
3 cups of diced tomatoes (about 3 medium-sized)
3 cups of diced seedless watermelon
1 1/2 cups of diced feta
2 Tablespoons of good, aged Sherry Vinegar
2 big handfuls of chopped mint (chocolate mint took over my garden this year and it worked beautifully!)
A splash of olive oil to finish
salt and pepper to taste, and I’m serious about that taste part! The feta could make your salad salty enough or it could use more. Get a spoon and find out before you feed your tribe!
Method
Toss the fruits, splash with vinegar, and chill for an hour. If too much juice has accumulated, strain it out and save it for a delightfully fruity salad dressing. Add the feta and mint and toss gently. Do your tasting and add a little salt if necessary. A quick grind of pepper and a splash of your best olive oil to finish. Serve it in the prettiest bowl you can find-the salad’s colors deserve it.
