The Last Hurrah...

Farmers' Markets all over the US are winding down. Most close down the end of October in the chillier parts of the country.

If you ever travel to Madison, Wisconsin, the Farmers' Market is a Must See. It's also a must participate! You have to get a freshly brewed cup of your favorite beverage from one of the stands. On a hot day they'll have fresh lemonade and other cool drinks too. Then head for one of the fabulous bakery stands and find something to munch on while you cruise along one of the best Farmers' Markets in the US. (At one point I saw that these markets were being rated and Madison ranked #5 in the US).

Our market was so famous we even got a visit one year from my cooking mentor Julia Child. I was lucky enough to get two tickets to her speech. My friend Kathi came with me. Julia's speech was a hoot! She did talk about our Farmers' Market and how blessed we were to have it, but then she rambled off in a commentary on the tour she took of our Wisconsin countryside. She pointed out things I had become so accustomed to that I thought they were 'normal'; nothing to cheer about. Take barns for instance. Julia had never seen so many red barns. And they had this "funny shape"; almost like they were wearing a hood like Little Red Riding Hood. As a child I thought all barns were shaped like that. I thought nothing of it. She thought they looked like "little chateaus".

Then she got talking about cows. Talk about a boring subject! I was raised in an area where I drove by herds of cows every day. Julia talked about how "cute our little black and white cows" are. She had been used to Brown Swiss. Those are the anomaly to me!

After the speech, most of us lined up to have our program or a cookbook autographed. Uncharacteristically, I turned completely tongue-tied. I twittered around her, had her sign my program and slinked away like I was guilty of something. I had blown my chance to actually speak to one of the greatest icons of the culinary arts that ever lived. I miss Julia.

One other reason to visit the Farmers' Market in Madison is where it's held. The capitol square in the middle of the city is just gorgeous. The gardens are beautiful and perfectly maintained. The capitol building looks just like the US national capitol. Same shape. Same gorgeous dome. Check it out. The building has been recently restored and is a stunner.

The Farmers' Market that I attend in Chicago is just a block away from my place, in a beautiful Victorian park. It's not as big as the Madison Farmers' Market but it has everything I need and some things I don't. For example, they have a booth with wonderful Polish pastries. I try to steer away from those. Instead I steer right toward things like the amazing heirloom tomatoes, the fresh cucumbers and onions galore. Which makes a perfect segue to today's recipe.

Tomato-Chipotle Gazpacho

As a last hurrah to the tomato crop let's make a gazpacho. Let's just not make it exactly the way I did for a party we had on Saturday. I decided the gazpacho needed a more exotic, smoky flavor so I added chipotle peppers in adobo. The mistake anyone can make (and I surely did) was to taste test my gazpacho at 2PM and decide it was prefect; forgetting that it was going to "ferment" for 5 more hours before we ate it. Trust me, chipotle peppers WILL grow stronger in the gazpacho so be careful how many you add or you'll attempt to sear the tongues of your guests like I did. It's a lot easier to add hot sauce at the table to your gazpacho than to try to pull out the fire from chilies later.

I also went two steps further. I served the gazpacho in tall pilsner glasses so it looked sort of like a Bloody Mary. I garnished it with fresh cocktail shrimp and a chili pepper. You could serve it in a tall glass and garnish it with the shrimp and other veggies that you garnish Bloody Marys with; including celery, olives and even smoked sausage bits.

The easiest way to make gazpacho is with your food processor. I'm going to assume you have one for these instructions. If you do not, just dice each item and add them to the mix in a large bowl.

Serves 8 to 10

3 ripe large red tomatoes (you can use other colors if you want. I just prefer red).
2 red bell peppers cut in large chunks, seeds and stem removed
2 cucumbers cut in large chunks
1 small sweet onion like Vidalia or Walla Walla
4 cloves of garlic minced (or 4 tsp of jar garlic will do)
1 tsp of salt
1 tsp of black pepper
1 chipotle pepper in adobo sauce (if you add more heed my warning above. Three is too many for all the but the most sturdy of eaters).
5 cups of tomato juice

Put the tomatoes in your food processor and pulse approx 10 times until finely chopped. Don't whiz it until you have mush. You want some chunks. Put this chopped mixture in a large bowl

Then put the peppers and the cucumbers in the processor and do the same thing. Add to large bowl with tomatoes.

Then add the onion, garlic, salt, pepper and chipotle pepper and chop that mixture until fine dice. Add this to the large bowl and add the tomato juice. Thoroughly stir. Take your bowl and put in a refrigerator for 3 hours or more to fully chill the gazpacho.

Serve in bowls with your choice of garnishes (i.e. chopped avocado, chopped cucumber or other). Or serve as suggested above with fresh cooked shrimp for a gazpacho shrimp cocktail appetizer.

Enjoy!
Cheers,
Zola

Send email to Zola at dinnerwithzola@hotmail.com.