Hot Shots - May 13, 2022
Hot Shots - May 13, 2022
Severin R-B Danieli
Hello all,
Just as I wrote that date I realized it is Friday the 13th! Spooky stuff. I am a huge scaredy cat when it comes to horror movies, and unfortunately, during high school I did watch one of the Friday the 13th movies. Terrible decision on my part.
This past weekend was a very busy one for me. My sister-in-law and I went down to the states on Saturday and had a hilarious and productive, albeit a bit unhinged, time. Sunday rolled around, Happy Mother's Day!, and I went to the opera, HMS Pinafore, with my mom. This opera opened in London on May 25th 1878 and ran for 571 performances, making it the second longest running musical theatre piece of that time.
The week was filled with of dog walks, an abundance of fresh green leaves on trees, buckets of rain, and time spent with family. My sister, mom and I talked the West Van seawall yesterday with baby Gabe, and as usual, marveled at how beautiful our city is. At the same time as we were walking the seawall, my dad was finishing up his two week walking tour in Ireland. He walked the Ring of Kerry, Dingle Peninsula and the Ring of Beara on Ireland's Southwest coast in 14 days - 12 if you count travel days!
Grapes! One of my fav fruits!
So delicious, bitesize, and as per Chandler Bing, "Grapes! Cause who can fit a watermelon in your mouth?" These grapes come up from Mexico, are the first of the year at Disco, and are from Masters Touch.
Masters Touch's grapes are hand-picked, hand trimmed and field packed before they make their way into the coolers to lower their temperature. The green grapes we have in house right now are the season opener, and go by the name perlette! A medium size, light green skin and sweet burst of flavour.
Add them into a salad, a charcuterie board, dehydrate them or just pop them into your mouth!
Pictured above are the grape vines, heavy with clusters of mouth-watering grapes. Yummy!
Speaking of grapes and watermelons....
We have watermelon bins available at Disco! These, just like the grapes, are the first delivery of the season, and they really do scream summer!
From Divine Flavor, we have 700# watermelon bins, that average 75-80 watermelons per bin. There are over 1200 varieties of watermelons grown worldwide, and are not actually a melon at all. They are actually a type of 'pepo' or 'false berry'. Should we change the name to waterpepo? waterfalseberry? Maybe not... but it is a cool melon fact!
The entire watermelon is edible, from flesh to rind to seeds, are grown on expansive vines and ripen somewhere between 85-100 days.
Oddly enough, down in the US, we went to Trader Joes and there was an item that I couldn't pass up - watermelon jerky. Simply dehydrated organic watermelon, and the taste was intense!
From Two EE's we have ginormous green dandelion leaves in 12ct boxes!
When I opened this box up I actually did a double take, as some of the biggest leaves were gently folded so that these greens could even fit inside the box!
In the backyard of our house, there are a decent amount of weeds growing between the blades of grass, and my husband made a comment, "wow, there are a lot of dandelions in the yard!" and I quickly answered, 'they are edible! don't worry!' Now, am I correct? Yes. Have I harvested them and made them into tinctures and teas? Absolutely not. But hey, it's the thought that counts, right?
Honeydew.
These 8ct melons come to us from Mexico and Llano farms. Also the first delivery of the season to Disco, I believe honeydew melons to be a sneaky crowd favourite.
The name honeydew melon were known in France as melon d'Antibes Blanc d'Hiver or White Antibes Winter melon. In 1911, these melons had made their way onto the New York hotel restaurant scene, and one restaurant guest had a honeydew melon, saved its seeds, and mailed them to John E. Gauger (who was a plant breeder).
Gauger was living in Colorado, and was known for his melon research and breeding. He worked with the USDA to identify the seeds variety, and in 1915, the USDA concluded that the mystery seed was from the White Antibes Winter melon. Gauger then took it upon himself to change the name to honeydew to make it more appealing to the commercial markets in the USA.
Lil Snappers!
We've got Pink lady and Granny smiths in convenient 3lb pouches from Stemilt from Washington State. Stemilt has grown organic produce since 1989, spurred on by founder Tom Mathison's mistrust of the food industry and his questions of 'where does my food come from?'
Granny smith and Pink lady are two of my favourite apples, other honourable mentions are McIntosh (didja know that McIntosh is the actual name of the apple and M(a)cIntosh is the name of the Apple Inc. computer? I just found that out!) , Jonagold and Ambrosia.
The McIntosh apple is a Canadian variety belonging to the rosaceae family, and was found growing in Matilda township of Ontario in Canada. John McIntosh owned this land, and in 1811 was clearing out sections of land when he happened upon several apple trees growing an unknown apple. Fast forward a few years, and in 1870 the McIntosh apple was readily available throughout Canada.
The Pink lady, or Cripps pink, is another apple who received its name from their breeder, John Cripps who was an English horticulturalist who moved to Western Australia. The name pink lady name came from a book John Cripps was reading, 'The Cruel Sea' published in 1951 by Nicholas Monsarrat, and the sailors in this book were drinking a cocktail known as the 'pink lady' which John Cripps took a liking too, and there you have it. The Pink lady apple varietal!
The Granny smith apple hails from Australia, was discovered in1868, then ventured to the UK in the 1930s, and finally to the USA in 1970s. Shave these apples up with arugula, feta and blueberries and you're in for a treat!
Tomatoes! So many options!
This past Tuesday, I was driving to work and listening to a podcast that mentioned that on that day (May 10th) in 1893, tomatoes were legally decided to be a vegetable by Supreme Court Justice Horace Gray.
He stated, “Botanically speaking, tomatoes are the fruit of the vine, just as are cucumbers, squashes, beans and peas. In the common language of the people, whether sellers or consumers of provisions, all these are vegetables which are grown in kitchen gardens, and which, whether eaten cooked or raw, are… usually served at dinner in, with, or after the soup, fish, or meats which constitute the principal part of the repast, and not, like fruits generally, as dessert.” And that was that. Tomatoes are were henceforth known as vegetables.
On hand here at Disco we have cherry grape tomatoes, tomatoes on the vine, roma tomatoes, beefsteak tomatoes and heirloom tomatoes!
Thanks for following along this week, hopefully you learned something interesting about a vegetable or fruit and you have an enjoyable and relaxing weekend!
I am heading up to whistler with my sister, mom, aunt and two cousins. My aunt and I are the ones who love to cook and we are already talking recipes and wine pairings - it's shaping up to be a good weekend!
Big love,
Severin R-B Danieli