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Welcome To Summer! Start by Checking these refreshing recipes from Bluebonnet.
Ah. yes, here we at the summer solstice---long hot days--shorter warm nights that are perfect
for ripening the "fruits of the vine."
Your deli cooks have been
visiting the local farmers' markets at Forsyth Park on Saturdays and Trustees Garden Wednesdays and Saturdays, picking up fresh organic local produce and turning it into simply
delicious dishes for you. Okra is happening now, as well as heirloom beans and tomatoes and yes, corn. I migrated to the southeast from the midwest and corn on the cob just wasn't ready in the fields until August! which
was the normal harvest time---fall. Things down here just have an earlier season and i am still acclimating to this phenomenon, never mind that field beans and okra were not "common" vegetables. So i am finding joy in thinking of ways to prepare these regional vegetables. And okra...that okra just loves its partner, tomato. What to do with those beautiful field beans/peas?
The other day I cooked some speckled beans that I bought at the farmers' market in water with onion--added a wee bit of chipotle chili powder for the heat of summer and some olive oil for flavor. it doesn't take that long to cook the fresh beans. When they finished cooking, I sauteed some more onion in olive oil, added chopped tomatoes with their juice and collards cut into bite-sized pieces and joined them with the cooked beans (having saved most of the bean juice), let them simmer briefly. I like my greens with a bit of structure. added more salt and pepper to taste and lemon to draw out the flavor. Yummm... Happy Solstice!
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