I like summer, because dishes in the dishrack dry really fast.

I mentioned that I had a lettuce-related plan but I was coy about the details.

This week in Culinate…

The omnivore’s salad

We’ve been eating salad a couple times a week since the farmers market started. Iris has even been gnawing on a leaf here and there. I mention this only briefly in the article, but roasted asparagus, cut into one-inch lengths, is a brilliant salad addition. As Laurie notes, in format and texture it’s kind of like avocado.

I’m a pretty good cook. I can work without a recipe. I am proficient with sauteing, frying, broiling, and steaming.

But I’ve never grilled.

That’s an exaggeration. When I was a teenager I used to take a couple of frozen Costco beef patties from the freezer, go out on the patio, and fire up the gas grill. When the patties were almost done, I’d throw on a couple slices of cheese, and toast the bun on the top rack of the grill. This wasn’t really cooking. “Really cooking” means there’s a chance you’re going down in flames. I did read something once about spiders nesting in the gas tubes and causing fiery death (of the griller as well as the spiders), which made the enterprise feel risky enough that I, a teenager, was drawn to it.

I ate quite a lot of these burgers. Sometimes I ate one *as a snack.* What they say about teenage boys is true. It’s the only time in my life I can remember having a big appetite, and I miss it; it would have come in handy during my restaurant critic days.

For all of my adult life I’ve lived in grill-incompatible apartments. We have a balcony here, and it’s technically legal to grill on it, but it wouldn’t be kind to our upstairs neighbors. That’s okay. I prefer pan-fried steaks to grilled ones, and it’s not hard to get grilled food when I go out to eat.

My grill fantasy is small-time. I want one of those small, rectangular grills used by Thai street vendors for satay and *moo ping* (pork on a stick). I love meat on a stick in all its forms, most of all satays with their lemongrass marinades and burnt edges. That Turkish dish that is like a wavy elongated meatball on a sword is awesome, too, and if anyone knows the name of it or even has any idea what I’m talking about, please comment.

What I really want isn’t a grill. I want a Thai street vendor to set up shop in front of my house. We could call our order off the balcony and send Iris down to the sidewalk with a couple bucks to pick up dinner. Papaya salad, an immodest number of satays, maybe a little lagniappe from the vendor’s Turkish friend. Iris needs to learn how to carry a sword sooner or later, anyway.

You know how I feel about corn. On the off-season, I sometimes turn to canned or frozen corn, but am usually disappointed. Canned tastes canned (which is actually a very nice thing in cornbread, to which I like to add a can of creamed corn), and frozen gets tough if you cook it for more than about twelve seconds. That’s a shame, because I like my corn cooked more like twelve minutes. My favorite thing to do with the stuff in summer is cook it off the cob in a skillet with bacon, scallions, and fresh jalapeños, until each kernel gets a little browned.

So imagine my delight when I found frozen roasted corn at Trader Joe’s. They roast the hell out of it *before* freezing. Many of the kernels are downright charred. It tastes like corn bacon. I made a quick succotash last week (thanks again, Cook’s Illustrated) with the TJ’s corn, lima beans, onion, red bell pepper, and a little tarragon. We ate it with the [catfish sandwiches](https://www.rootsandgrubs.com/2007/06/02/mamsters-in-the-market/), and there was plenty left over.

What else should I do with this blackened corn?

Two new food-related children’s books of note.

Where Is the Cake? (Thé Tjong-Khing)

A couple of opossums, or possibly mice, steal a cake from some dogs. Meanwhile, a little mouse loses her stuffed animal, and there’s a snake, and a family of ducks, and some weird transparent creatures that Iris says are not ghosts because “ghosts don’t have tails,” and a friendly dinosaur. Pure illustration, no words.

I’d Really Like to Eat a Child (Sylviane Donnio)

A baby crocodile would really like to a eat a child. There’s a funny surprise ending–although I guess a big illustration of a crocodile devouring a child would have been even more surprising. After looking at the lovely evocations of the crocodile family’s tropical home, I have to say I’d really like to put on a grass skirt.

P.S.: Despite what the link implies, Sylviane Donnio is the name of the author, not the child.