Archive for Cooking

Creeping Socialist Casserole

by John Weckerle

Okay, we admit it, this is not about creeping socialists; it’s a recipe.  Ever since your editor read that phrase on the East Mountain Tea Party web site, though, it keeps popping into his head and cracking him up.  We want to be clear: this is is one of the most ridiculously paranoid combinations of words we’ve run across in a while, but it’s so ridiculous that it’s kind of funny, and we can imagine that the ghost of Vladimir Lenin is slapping George Soros’s knee over it, too.  I guess you could say that the zucchini and yellow squash represent the ultra-left-wing vegetarian peril lurking beneath the veneer of American “sausage,” pepper and onion patriotism – and then take it a step further and take the that the “sausage” is also some cynical, unauthentic, Socialist-Marxist exploitation of our meat heritage.  And don’t get me started on the liberal cheddar cheese conspiracy.

At any rate, Sunday found us not wanting any of the food we had ready to eat, and a bunch of summer squash with which to deal, so your editor decided to go off the map and do something unusual.  Here’s how it went:

»» Creeping Socialist Casserole

Grow Your Own: What On Earth…

NOTE!!!!: The “sorta-recipe” in this article relies on a frying pan with an oven-safe handle.  If you don’t have one, leave a comment and we’ll give you an entirely stove-top alternative.

by John Weckerle

…do we do with all this stuff?

Any of our readers who have had success in growing summer squash – including zucchini and the classic yellow squash – have probably found themselves with a superfluity, as it were, of would-be food.  We say “would-be” of course, because it’s not food until you cook it up and eat it, although we do admit that small specimens make a nice raw snack, either in salads or cut into strips with a little ranch dressing.  Or balsamic vinaigrette.  Or pretty much anything into which one likes to dip one’s vegetables.

Even so, gardeners do occasionally run into surpluses that surpass their capacity for dipping.  There is, of course, zucchini bread, and we can speak from experience on the subject of zucchini parmigiana.  Anybody who can make eggplant parmigiana can do it with zucchini.  We’ll cover that at another time, because if you’re a working person who needs something quick, parmigiana is probably not the thing – but if you want a recipe, let us know.  In the meantime, let’s talk frittata.

»» Grow Your Own: What On Earth…

Wyngette Soup

by John Weckerle

As outlined in Saturday’s article, we are awash in squash, and decided to take the time yesterday to make some wyngette soup (to make wyngette soup, you take whatever vegetables you have on hand, and wyngette).  Yesterday’s variety contained onions, garlic, zucchini, carrots, parsnips, celery canned diced tomatoes, lentils, and green bell peppers.  Today, we’ll share the “recipe” – such as it is – and some thoughts on wyngette soup making.

The first thing to understand about spontaneous soup making is that any “recipe” is really just a guideline.  There’s no real right or wrong way, and if you want to make a change, you’re probably not going to hurt things much: if you don’t like parsnips, leave them out, and if you want more onions, then toss in more onions.  So here we go (and remember, quantities are “give or take”): »» Wyngette Soup