Cold Cucumber Buttermilk Soup

Every year, cucumber season rolls into my garden and every year I try to figure out how to use them up before they take over my refrigerator. I've cooked them (stir-fry is good and the French do a nice job too). Salads are great, of course (here's an Asian inspired one). Cold cucumber soup is always a delicious solution because cucumbers are hot season, summer vegetables and a chilled soup can be so refreshing. This soup requires absolutely no cooking at all. Just need a blender. It's really a cucumber buttermilk smoothie!

Cold Cucumber Buttermilk Soup
(serves 8)

2 scallions, white and green parts, coarsely chopped
2 pounds cucumber, peeled, seeded and coarsely chopped
4 cups (1 quart) low-fat buttermilk
1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt
1 ½ teaspoons sugar
1 pinch to ¼ teaspoon cayenne (adjust according to your heat tolerance)
¼ teaspoon black pepper
2 teaspoon fresh lemon or lime juice
2 Tablespoons fresh mint, chopped

1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and small-diced
mint sprigs

For most blenders, you'll need to make this in 2 batches. Put 2 cups of buttermilk, ½ of the cucumber, the scallions, and all the seasonings in the blender and puree until the mixture is smooth. Pour into a large bowl. Repeat with the remaining buttermilk and cucumber. Pour this into the already blended stuff in the bowl. Mix to combine. Cover and place in the fridge for about an hour to allow the flavors to meld a bit. Taste for salt, cayenne, and black pepper. Chilled soups often need more salt because the cold mutes the seasonings. Adjust according to your taste.

To serve, pour into bowls and garnish with a little diced cucumber and a mint sprig.

Keeps in the fridge for a couple of days.

Chunk Pickles

The verdict is in (on the pickles I made back in August). These are delicious. Sweet and spicy. Nice tang and good crunch. One reason I like this recipe is you can use any size of cucumbers, not just pickling cukes. My garden isn't big enough to produce enough pickling cukes at once (I hope to change that next year when I take out a tree to get more sunlight on my garden). The original recipe calls for alum. Alum is not added to pickles anymore, so I've left it out. I also up'ed the amount of syrup. The original recipe didn't make enough to fill all the jars. I left the proportions the same.

Chunk Pickles
(makes about 5 pints)

Cooking Cucumber: the French Way

Cucumbers - at least one plant in my garden every summer

I previously blogged about cooking cucumber. Those recipes were Asian-inspired. I mentioned that the French cook cucumber too and that Julia Child had a number of recipes for cooked cucumber. As befitting a proper French dish, many of them contain a heckuva lot of cream. France has some of the richest dairy land in the world and they are justly proud of their cream and cheese. Still, as much as I love cream, her recipes seem a bit excessive to me. As sacrilegious as it may sound, I'm going to tweak dear Julia's recipe.

The basics remain the same: you need to draw out much of the water in the cucumber before baking it. Otherwise, you end up with soupy boiled cucumber, which isn't all that appetizing.

Baked Cucumber with Cream
(serves 4-6)

6 medium cucumbers
2 Tablespoons white wine vinegar
⅛ teaspoon sugar
1 ½ teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons unsalted butter
2 Tablespoons chopped fresh dill (or use basil or parsley)
⅛ teaspoon black pepper
3 Tablespoons heavy cream
more black pepper

Peel the cucumbers and cut in half lengthwise. Scoop out the seeds with a spoon. Slice the cucumbers the long way into about ½" slices. Then cut into 3" pieces. Place in a large bowl. Sprinkle with vinegar, sugar, and salt. Mix and let sit for 30 minute to an hour. Drain, pour onto a towel, arrange in a single layer then pat dry with another towel. You want the cucumber pieces dry so they cook up crisp.

Preheat the oven to 375°F.

Melt the butter with the fresh herbs and ⅛ teaspoon black pepper in a small saucepan. Place the cucumbers in a large shallow baking dish - large enough so the cucumbers are in a single layer. Pour over the melted butter and mix. Place the baking dish in the oven and bake for 50 minutes, stirring a few times during the baking. Remove from oven. Stir in cream and additional black pepper, if desired. Serve immediately.

Adapted from Mastering the Art of French Cooking: Volume One - Julia Child, Louisette Bertholle and Simone Beck, Borzoi, 1961.

Making Pickles

My latest project...called chunk pickles. An old recipe from a book called Preserving in Today's Kitchen by Jeanne Lesem, where "today" is circa 1985. The description says the recipe is way older than 1985, however. I've found lots of great recipes from this book: the recipe for quick dills on my School of Eating Good blog is from the same book. These are not quick pickles. They need to sit for about a day and a half in salt water, get packed in jars, heated (though not actually canned), and covered in brine. Then they sit for 2 months. So, no recipe for these since I have no idea how they are going to turn out. Come back in mid-October to find out.