The greatest scapes.

Happy summer, everyone! What a crazy start it's been, kicking off non-stop travel and/or hosting family in town for just about two straight months. We've also taken summer cooking to the next level with the wonderful addition of our Land's Sake CSA, which I've been anticipating for a while. Every Thursday I brave rush hour traffic into the suburbs to retrieve fresh greens, herbs and a continually evolving cornucopia of other delights. It sounds kind of silly, but it struck me the first time I was washing lettuce from the farm that there was actually dirt between the leaves. Each week fellow CSAers select a set of items from crates of harvested goods listed on a blackboard (last week: cone cabbage, rainbow chard, curly kale, Hakurei turnips, butter lettuce, zucchini, zephyr squash, dill, cilantro, garlic scapes), and then there are you-pick vegetables from the field as well (peas, thyme, sage).

It's been highly educational so far...first of all, I've never seen a pea on the vine. I actually caught myself giggling as I plucked the fat, green pods off their curly vines (could I help it if one or two popped right open into my hand, little jewels defying gravity and somehow falling upward into my mouth?). Let me tell you, it took me quite a bit of time and effort to harvest just one little basket of peas.

Secondly, I learned that you can eat turnip leaves! (They turned out lovely, sautéed with their roots in butter, served over farro.) Thirdly, garlic what? (Even Chrome spell check doesn't recognize "scapes.") The helpful weekly newsletter Land's Sake sends included both a description ("These wild tendrils, tamed into bunches each day, are actually the flower stalks of our garlic plants...although green and tender, scapes retain a garlic taste") and a recipe for garlic scape pesto. I adapted it just a tad by adding a bright zing of lemon and added my slaved-over field peas, and dinner was wonderfully garlicky, light and satisfying. Looking forward to whatever else this summer brings.

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Spaghetti with Garlic Scape Pesto and Sugar Snaps
Pesto makes 8 servings; use half the sauce with the listed amounts of spaghetti and peas, and keep the rest up to a week in the fridge/freeze after.

1 1/2 c roughly chopped garlic scapes
zest and juice from one lemon
1/2 t Kosher salt
1/4 t ground black pepper
1 c olive oil
1 c grated Parmesan cheese

~12 oz sugar snap peas (remove the tough strings on either side of the pod)
8 oz spaghetti

Bring salted water to a boil for the pasta. Meanwhile, combine garlic scapes, lemon zest and juice, salt and pepper in a food processor and pulse until well chopped but not smooth. With the food processor running, slowly pour olive oil in a stream to incorporate into a slightly chunky paste. Add cheese and pulse to combine. Taste and adjust seasonings as you like.

Cook pasta and in the last 2 minutes of cook time, add the peas and cook until bright green. Drain peas and pasta and add generous spoonfuls of pesto. Sprinkle a little more Parmesan, twirl on a fork and enjoy!