Friday foods

The high season is starting at the farmers' market near us, and if I'm not careful, I go overboard and "buy the farm."  I think I overdid it just a little today.  Tomatoes are starting to make an appearance, lettuces are popping up, and now the fruits are abundant--the strawberries are gone, but the blueberries are still holding their own, and they've been joined by cherries, peaches and apricots.  Oh, and the CSA had corn yesterday! Corn and tomatoes make me a little emotional.  Must be memories of eating dinner (Southern for lunch) at my grandmother's.  

I've been doing two things in the kitchen today:  The first was making Yumm! bowls with a Yumm! sauce recipe that Susan had found.  Cafe Yumm! is where we ate lunch in Eugene, OR every chance we got while on vacation.  They sell the sauce, and I wanted to buy a jar, but with today's air travel constraints, it just didn't make sense.  So I determined to imitate it the best I could, and Susan sent me a recipe she had found.  I think it turned out pretty decently from what I can remember, though a little too runny.  Next time I'll use less water.

If you want to try it, here's the recipe.  It's someone's approximation, so if you're familiar with the original, it may not be all you imagined, but I think it's close enough:

Original Yumm! Sauce:

1/2 c. oil (I used canola)

1/2 c. almonds

1/3 c. nutritional yeast

1/3 c. garbanzo beans

1/4 c. soy beans (These seem to be hard to find.  Some people have used 1/2 c. tofu, and I used black soy beans)

1/2 c. water (I'll use less next time)

1/2 c. lemon juice (about 3 lemons, or a little more)

2 garlic cloves

1/2 t. salt

1 t. curry powder

Blend nuts, beans and oil in a food processor.  Then blend in yeast and liquids one at a time.  Puree until smooth.  

(It doesn't say when to put in the garlic, but I think it belongs in there with the nuts and beans.  And Susan, you were concerned about the amount of curry.  Did you ever try it, and if so, what did you think?)

Cook some brown rice while you're making the sauce.  This goes on the bottom of the bowl.  On top of that, put a layer of black beans, then the sauce, and then whatever toppings you want.  The ones I remember from the restaurant are:  cilantro, avocado, black olives, cheese, tomatoes and sour cream.  

Here's what it looked like:

The second thing I did in the kitchen was an emergency refrigerator cleaning.  Yup, it's that time of year when, if you're not careful, old CSA veggies get pushed to the back of the refrigerator and lost.  The problem is compounded by the local food practice of putting produce in whatever bags you happen to have, most of which are opaque.  That can be really counter-productive when you're looking for that green pepper that you just know you bought a few days ago and you need it for spaghetti sauce right this minute! I'm also trying to store leftovers in jars or reused containers instead of plastic bags, which means that if you open my refrigerator right now, you see lots of bowls with saucers stuck on top, and lots of reused jelly jars. Things were falling out every time I opened the door.  This should not happen in a family of three!  

So, what did I do?  After cleaning out a few items that I thought just needed to be pitched, I got office file labels and labeled the bags.  "Corn--use right away.  Basil--for pesto."  That sort of thing.  We'll see how well that works.  If anyone has a better idea, I'd be happy to hear it.  Farmers' markets also sell lots of herbs that still have the roots attached, so I put those in glasses of water and put whatever transparent bags I have over the top.  They seem to keep a lot longer that way.  And I stacked a lot of things or found smaller containers for them.  Our refrigerator still looks, well, eccentric, but at least it's in some kind of order, and I know what's in it.  But by the time I washed all the emptied containers and Yumm! sauce dishes, that job had taken a good hour.  

That's enough time in the kitchen until, oh, say 5 p.m., so I'm going to do some reading or desk work for a while.  I'm very glad we get to spend the afternoon at home.  

***

I'm back in the kitchen, for the evening, and think I'll add another farmers' market food idea, because I had a sample and it was really good!  (And also because I need to write it down somewhere.)  It was a salad using very fresh snap peas (by which I mean shelled peas, in case there's regional difference in terms), mint, basil, red onion, and arugula.  There wasn't too much arugula, so it wasn't a very leafy salad.  Most of the leaves were about the size of the mint.  The dressing was vinaigrette.  Delicious!