One Cook, One Garden

Remember Spring? That was when we looked at that vast expanse of freshly turned earth and at our teensy, tiny little vegetable plants, and thought to ourselves, "these babies will have lots of room to grow." Oh - and there would be so much time to use the veggies to create sauces and canned goods for later in the year. I can actually envision what I was thinking then. In fact, in that vision, the kitchen is well organized and the counters are clear. There were no dirty dishes, no baskets full of drying herbs, I was wearing something chic, great haircut, thinner - and definitely NOT sweating. Reality is somewhat different.We won't even get into the haircut. One counter holds a perpetual supply of peaches from the stand down the road. At this time of year, dinner is usually a couple of peaches cut up and eaten, just so. The other long counter holds an assortment of vegetables that A) I brought in from the garden, B) came home from market or a farm stand, or C) my sister cagily left there on her way to the living room.The kitchen table is half shipping department and half herb drying/processing station with some beans drying for next year's garden. Half of the room is currently taken up with cartons of magazines waiting to be readied for mailing. Today I'll make and freeze some roasted tomato sauce. The other night the peaches were getting boring (hard to believe, isn't it?), and it was too hot to really cook. Sometimes you just need something more. The following was delicious: I threw a small handful of angel hair pasta into a pan of boiling water and went out to gather some basil, which was chopped into very thin strips. Poured about a tablespoon of olive oil into a bowl. Diced up a tomato and added to the oil and basil, muddling it up a little bit, and then added a clove of crushed garlic. When the pasta was done, I added a handful of grated mozzarella and a little Parmesan cheese and stirred it to melt it together. Topped with the tomato/basil/garlic oil. Judging by the glut of cucumbers, tonight will probably be some cucumber lime salsa with chips. And some peaches.