The greenmarket early on summer mornings is the best. There is just so much, so much variety, and so many rare items that we’ve never seen before. You have to get there early before these more unique offerings sell out, but we do anyway due to the heat and the crowds (plus it’s easier to take picture).
One summer vegetable that is going crazy right now is eggplants. There were typical eggplants abound, but we saw these unique long eggplants, as well as the orange “Turkish eggplants” (no, they aren’t tomatoes!). We bought some so we will let you know how they are. Finally, we saw fairtytale eggplants again (the little ones) but we also saw one that belongs in a fairy tale, that is shaped like a head!
Tomatoes and bell peppers are also everywhere. Some of the heirloom tomatoes are beautiful.
Summer peaches and apricots…
… and cherries everywhere! Cherries are approaching the end of their season in NY, so Lindsay is going nuts canning them today. Look for more posts soon. The dark ones are sweet cherries and the lighter ones are sour cherries, although I would have guessed backwards on that one based on how they look.
Our friends at Northshire Farm had some excellent summer squash and zucchinis. They also had the onion blossoms below. I know, I hear “onion” and “blossom” in the same sentence and I think of a giant fried ball at Outback Steakhouse, but this is not that. The little white flowers have a very strong but unique onion taste… strong but kind of sweet. I’ve been picking at them all afternoon, but we’re trying to come up with a recipe to feature them in.
Anther new one for us was cranberry beans. The sign set up by Lani’s Farm says “LIke Lima beans they have a sweet and nutty flavor with creamy and meeaty textures. Shell and cook for 8-10 minutes.” We already had too much so we skipped them this week, but now that we know about them I want to try them next week.
Keith’s Farm also has it’s famous Rocambole garlic, which right now is halfway between being spring garlic and dries garlic. A few more weeks and those greens will be the dry husks that most people are used to. Once the garlic bulbs get to size they braid the greens of 10+ garlics and hang and dry the bunches (to keep vampires away).
Paffenroth Gardens has to many types of radishes right now: regular red, purple plum, white icicle, and white/pink French / breakfast radishes. Last weekend we tried the breakfast radished, sliced thinly and placed on buttered toast, then salted. They were delicious. I recommend. Finally, we saw the first real corn of the season!
Speaking of the corn, we couldn’t wait. We had it steamed for lunch, with some leftover homemade pizza from last night. In case you’re wondering, the pizza features red spring onions, spring garlic, fresh tomatoes, and purple Amaranth leaves, which were very bitter raw but mellowed out to a nice crunch and brought a really earthy flavor to the pizza.
