What is it about cooler weather that really turns on the contemplative thoughts? Perhaps the seasonal shifting, the cycle of old plants giving way to new ones encourages my mind to wander. Or maybe it's truly that my brain can think at full capacity again after several months of intense heat!
I've been thinking about the veggies I'll miss, and the ones I'm looking forward to. Tomatoes are at the top of my will-miss list. Simple but delectable tomato sandwiches, silky mayo oozing and tomato juices dripping. Grilled and charred zucchini slices, sprinkled with salt and parmesan cheese. A refreshing cucumber salad with fragrant herbs.
I think it's the simplicity of summer eating that makes me fall in love with this season each year. While admittedly a self-proclaimed kitchen project person, I do revel in the appreciation of a vegetable's flavor without much adornment. The warmth of the August sun on a ripe cherry tomato? Incredible.
And this ease of food during the summer is sorely needed! When your brain is melting and your skin is perhaps a bit red from not-frequent-enough sunscreen application, the joy of singular vegetable flavors is unmatched. The sugars and acids of summer sweet peppers, tomatoes, and cucumbers are readily available upon your first bite, welcoming the barest addition of flavorful olive oil and salt.
It's the slow return of cooler temperatures and shorter days that inspires, at least in me, the return to more elaborate meals and more time spent in the kitchen. And so too the new seasonal vegetables and their heartiness. Roasting, braising, and caramelizing are now needed to bring out the sweetness from the produce we have available. The potential of a hard-skinned squash or durable bunch of kale is inviting to my culinary mind at just the right time when said mind is fully back in ON mode.
We always schedule a little break between our summer and fall seasons to give our newly planted fall veggies a chance to grow and to give us farmers a chance to rest! Regardless of what the season throws at us, summer is always a busy time. This time off also helps me to start the transition of eating summer to eating fall.
It's not an ON and OFF switch kind of thing, but a dimmer slide that I drag out as long as I can. I never want to say goodbye to summer tomatoes! But the signs of fall are quite literally piling up around me, in the form of crates and crates full of spaghetti and delicata squash. The office maze of produce is now split between these hard, long-lasting autumnal beauties and the delicate rainbow of heirlooms, roma, and cherry tomatoes.
I'll roast spaghetti squash halves and top them with a lightly cooked tomato sauce from the most ripe, cracking, bursting with juice tomatoes. A salad will incorporate caramelized slices of roasted delicata squash alongside cucumbers, basil, and sweet bell peppers. I suppose it's my way of extending each season as much as possible, of blurring the lines, of easing the transition.
Regardless of which side you're on, this liminal time is full of beauty and good eats. I'm going to try enjoy it to the fullest, without prematurely mourning the long days of summer. Not when there are still tomatoes to be picked!
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