Hello everyone, and I apologize for
being a tad late with this week’s post. It’s been a very busy few weeks here at
the Village! That said, our friendly Pathfinder Produce team is getting
ready for this week’s delicious and fresh market at the Village Commons on
Thursday, from noon to 5 p.m.
Pathfinder is transitioning into fall
with the opening of Pathfinder School and Otsego Academy (welcome students!),
the start of another fun and competitive community soccer season at Grant’s
Field, and with the local middle school and high school students using our
Community Trails to train for their cross-country season. Fall is a great
time to discover new activities too … just take a walk outside to explore the
community around you.
Below, my colleague Martha Spiegel
shares a tale of culinary exploration which sounds tempting!
***
I discovered a new (to me) kind of pepper a couple
of weeks ago—shishito peppers. As the name suggests, these peppers originated
in Japan. They are green, about the length of a jalapeno, but much thinner and
wrinkly looking. They are a mild, flavorful, sweet pepper, although about one
in ten packs a little bit of a punch. They are healthy
little guys too, containing antioxidants, Vitamin C, and dietary fiber.
A couple of my grandkids tried them raw. Jack, our
8-year-old foodie, thought they were scrumptious. Thea, the 3-year-old, said
“It’s a spicy pepper,” but she said it with a smile and continued munching. My
husband and son also liked them.
I am not a huge fan of any raw pepper, so I looked
for ways to cook them. By far the most suggested method is to sauté
them in hot olive oil until they’re blistered, and then finish them off
with some sea salt and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice. Then you just grab them
by the stem and bite the whole thing off. It’s so easy, and they’re delicious!
We did find that if you bite too close to the skin
you can get a bunch of seeds in your mouth, so if this doesn’t appeal to you,
bite it off a little farther down as the seeds are mostly clustered at the top.
There are some other recipes
that I have found but have not tried yet. Some of them sound really tasty so
I’m sure I’ll be experimenting more with shishitos.
Until next time, explore and explore some more!
Martha (and Lori)
