Sunday, June 6, 2010

When Life Gives You Radishes.....



....make radish sandwiches!

Between my own garden, and "my" farm in Roanoke, it's still mostly spring onions and radishes lately.  The tomatoes and green beans are teasing us, as are the cucumbers.

We had another party to go to last night and I had picked up a bunch of produce from my farm share in the morning.  The hostess had asked me to bring an hors d'oeuvre.  Once again, the challenge was to find a way to use what is local and in season, rather than resorting to the soulless yet abundant produce at the grocery store.

One of my favorite cooking websites is epicurious.  I typed "radish" and "scallion" into their recipe search, and voila!  Several recipes for radish finger sandwiches.  As usual, I scanned the various recipes, as well as the comments sections, and came up with a plan of my own.

First, I made a compound butter using finely chopped spring onions, parsley, anchovy paste and some really nice French sea salt.

Then I sliced the radishes very thinly using a mandolin.  These radishes are very spicy, so they got a quick soak in some lime juice.

Finally, assembly!  Very thin whole wheat bread, butter both slices, layer the radishes, trim the crusts and cut into little pieces.  I thought they were delicious and the sea salt really brought out the flavors.


Sadly, I think my garden is done giving me radishes.  Between the heat and the fact that one of the dogs tried to hide a dead bird in the radish section, well, maybe I'll replant in the fall when it's cooler.  They only take about 4 weeks from planting to crunchy yumminess!

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