GREEN PEA AND CUCUMBER ‘GAZPACHO’
In Italian, ‘casino’ means ‘brothel,’ or more colloquially, a hot mess. If it was a wild and crazy night, it was casino. If someone comes into the office utterly disheveled from last night’s casino, they’re a casino. If you can’t get anywhere on the train because there’s a nationwide sciopera (an organized strike), tutto è casino.
You get the point.
The other point is that I’m from Georgia, where everything gets dipped in Ranch. This sauce is a terrific and vibrant riff on buttermilk ranch, so we’ve used it for everything from a spicy wing dip to a snap pea and radish salad dressing to a dip for fried pickles. (Fair warning: keep your straws under lock and key for this one. Actually, don’t use straws; they kill cute baby squids.)
Although we’ve tamed down the ‘casino’ nature of the sauce since its original conception, it’s still crazy wild good.
Also, in Italy, there’s a hand signal for everything. Probably the only unifying language that stretches across the entirety of the boot. ‘But WHY?’ ‘Let’s blow this popsicle stand.’ ‘You may politely go and render unto thyself a profane gesture of your choosing.’ There’s a hand gesture for all of them.
Across restaurants in the States, there’s another catalogue of hand signs for bar and dining guests to expedite their—let’s call a spade a spade here—often pedestrian requests. Of these, one of the most recognizable, often accompanied by a slight wincing, is curling up a thumb and forefinger about an inch apart to signify ‘can I get a side of Ranch’ (to dump over this nicely prepared filet or dunk my pizza crust in)? But as I always say, ‘Live and let Ranch.’
Serves: 4
SNAP SALAD
2 cups fresh sugar snap peas
4-6 radishes, gently grilled and quartered
1 cup fresh mint
½ cup fresh dill
½ cup parsley
FOR GAZPACHO:
Yield: ~1 quart
2 cups sweet green peas
330g (2 ea.) cucumber, peeled and seeded
155g (3 ea.) tomatillo
40g (1 ea.) small jalapeno, seeds and pith removed
25g (½ ea.) lemon juice
16g honey
16g (1 TBL) mirin (see note)
16g (1 TBL) sherry vinegar
12g (2 tsp) rice wine vinegar
6g (1-2 ea.) garlic
2g (½ tsp) salt
1g (big pinch) black pepper
1 cup h2o
First up, blanching. Blanching does two things: number one, blanching helps preserve color and flavor by prohibiting enzymes from breaking down the produce. Number two, it loosens the fibers and softens the texture. Ok. Bring a large pot (6ish quarts) of h2o to a rolling boil. While waiting for water, process the veggies and build the rest of the soup base. See below. Prepare an ice bath in a large bowl or cambro. Salt both waters. Drop frozen peas into the boil for 3 minutes or so, until the water has returned to a boil and peas are swirling near the surface. Taste one. You want a pea that’s cooked but hasn’t lost any color. Scoop and plunge immediately into the ice bath until completely cooled. Add to blender or Vitamix.
Repeat with the snap peas, but blanch only 30 seconds to a minute, depending on the freshness and quality of the snaps. How do you determine that? Take a bite out of one. If it’s waxy and fibrous and requires enough chewing that you’re thinking about the fact that you’re still chewing by the end of this paragraph, then blanch them. If they’re sweet and crisp and tender and you’re immediately reaching for another, they may need no blanching at all. I like a mix of blanched—then snapped down the seams with peas intact down the shell—and a few raw, sliced into ⅛” slivers.
Repeat with the snap peas, but blanch only 30 seconds to a minute, depending on the freshness and quality of the snaps. How do you determine that? Take a bite out of one. If it’s waxy and fibrous and requires enough chewing that you’re thinking about the fact that you’re still chewing by the end of this paragraph, then blanch them. If they’re sweet and crisp and tender and you’re immediately reaching for another, they may need no blanching at all. I like a mix of blanched—then snapped down the seams with peas intact down the shell—and a few raw, sliced into ⅛” slivers.
Other veg processing: for the cukes, peel and halve lengthwise. Use a spoon to remove the watery, seeded center, and roughly slice into chunks; remove husks from tomatillos and cut into quarters; remove stem, seeds, and pith from jalapeno and discard if desired, otherwise cut into 1” pieces and add to blender with everything else.
Notes:
- The weights on the produce can vary quite a bit, so go by count and just tweak seasonings/sweetness/salt as your palate prefers.
- Mirin is a sweet Japanese rice wine, similar to sake but with lower ABV and higher sugar content, used exclusively for cooking. It’s an easy reach when wanting to round out the flavor with a hint of sweetness. Sweet cooking wine or diluted honey will also work just fine.
FOR PLATING:
Place a tablespoon of the fresh ricotta in the center of your serving bowl acting as a pillow or landing pad for your salad. Toss snaps and radishes in a large mixing bowl with a couple tablespoons of the casino sauce and a pinch of salt until evenly dressed, then bundle-stack on top of the ricotta. Gently mix fresh herbs with a splash of lemon juice and place on top of snaps. (Alternatively toss herbs with snaps and radishes all together.) Ladle 6-8 ounces of gazpacho into the bowl around the salad, attempting to disturb the salad as little as possible.