Cold peanut noodles and the July Garden - stir-fry season

Cold noodles + garden veggies in homemade peanut sauce on a hot day

Well, I have about a million blog posts I intend to write, but for now a short one will have to do.   It's July, it's hot as balls up here in the northeast, and things are moving at their usual unpredictable schedule.   The tomatoes just grew out of their cages, but so far everything is green, green green.  Green tomatoes, tiny green peppers, green peas, dark green kale, bluish-green broccoli (still no heads), neon-green cabbage.   The hot weather stuff is still coming:  in what I think is a first for this year, no eggplants, beans or cukes yet.   We are late.



(My cousin suggests that my overzealous co-planting may be the culprit...I deny any and all such accusations.)

But the peas have come and gone (reminder to self: peak pea harvest is in mid-to-late JUNE, fool, not May like I always imagine).   The lettuce and spinach was all harvested right before it bolted (although I'm trying to grow baby lettuce in the shade...).  Instead of trying to make it last until bolting, this year I pulled all the plants and made a cheese-spinach souffle with eggs from Rachel's farm.  It rose about four inches - not bad for a first try.   By the end of lettuce season we were putting together a pretty respectable salad from the garden.

Next month I'll be trying to melt together peppers and tomatoes, fry eggplants and potatoes, and can or freeze everything that moves.   But this couple of weeks belongs to sweet and tender greens: bok choi, (early) cabbages, kale (don't tell Dawn, but I've started putting it in everythig), spring onions, some early purple carrots (yeah!) and of course, the last of the peas.  Tonight I cooked all of it into a cold peanut noodle dish I was craving because its so hot. Its fun to not have to think about recipes...just go downstairs and see what's ready.   I'm still amazed that even before the tomatoes and onions come in, I can make almost 50% of a meal from what I grow.  In early July, I've got a mandate from the backyard: eat brassicas now!*

In the winter I flip through recipe books, trying to decide what to cook, looking for inspiration.   Now I'm enjoying eating our way through out bumper crop.   Also, I end up forced to make some harvest social events -  at this time of year, dinner guests are in danger of becoming simply receptacles for bok choi and cabbage.

Making decisions about harvesting and cooking also pushes against my natural hording impulses....I want each season of food to last forever, in small, meal-sized harvests.  I want it to be on deck, waiting for me, just like it is in the supermarket.   But that's not how it works: each little mini-season is a flash in the pan - a whole year of waiting followed by a vegetable assault squadron.   In the past I've been known to leave things in the ground too long, hoping to stretch out our time together...but then the lettuce bolts or bugs eat the beans.   I've also harvested things early, or tried to pull one leaf at a time, or save them in the fridge, only to have the fruits of all that work start to rot or spoil. Of course, another option is to do food-preservation work: cold storage, freezing, drying, or canning.   But this is a) hard to do with veggies this time of year (lettuce doesn't freeze well), and b) just a lot of work. (this is one reason that I love root vegetables - designed to store sugars, they are the my most loyal plant friends, lasting, with very little effort if you plan it right, all the way until the harvest starts next year, or if you're me, until you eat the ever-loving bazungas out of them and finish in November).    So this year I'm saving the saving for things that will truly come in excess: tomatoes, beans and potatoes.  With this crop I'm trying to opt for abundance.  Mantra? eat as much as you can, while you can.  Pull up the whole plant, even if its small, even if you might want it for a recipe later.   Don't bother grabbing a couple of leaves - pull it out and make room for something else.   Chop them up and serve them to your friends, or roommates, or yourself.   Harvest now, while things are tender and young.   Don't wait - who knows what the slugs or the sun or just the passage of time will do. And who knows if you'll be in the mood to cook as the weather gets hotter?  Feed people now and let tomorrow take care of itself.  Because when this harvest is over, another one will probably be starting up. 

First carrots and onions, with kale and nasturtium flower

Recipe for cold peanut noodles and veggies:  (On a hot day, the only thing you really have to cook is the pasta!)

Pasta (I like very skinny spaghetti, or any Asian noodles)
garden vegetables (for me it was carrots, green onions, peas, and kale, plus a leftover supermarket cucumber).

Peanut Sauce:
3 T peanut butter (preferably unsweetened, but mine never is...)
2 T rice wine vinegar
1 fat bulb garlic, crushed in a press or chopped fine
2 t soysauce (to taste)
1/2 t chili oil or chili paste
1 t chopped cilantro
1 t brown sugar
salt

Boil water for pasta, following package directions.  Cook, drain and put in the fridge to cool.
Mix sauce ingredients together (I do mine in a double boiler to soften the peanut butter).   taste for salt, sugar, and spice, then add 2-4 T warm water to get the desired consistency.  
Prepare vegetables.   Whether or how much you cook is a matter of your own preferences - I boiled my kale and carrots briefly in salted water, and sauteed the onions and peas in butter before throwing them into the peanut sauce - but the dish would be great with the crunch of raw veggies, too.
Mix the sauce, veggies and noodles together.   Add a couple tablespoons of warm water if you're having trouble getting the sauce to coat the noodles.  (This is a Mark Bittman trick for pesto/pasta combos, and it seems to work for peanut sauce, too).   Stick in the fridge.
I cut up the cucumbers, threw a little rice wine vinegar on them and kept them in the fridge for 20 minutes or so before serving to keep them crisp and give them a little kick.
Serve the dish topped with the cut-up cukes and a little chopped cilantro if you have it.   Yum!



*Brassicas are the name for cabbage-family plants: broccoli, cabbage, kale, and Asian cabbages like bok choi.