A Garden in Bloom - Cucumbers

This is my first year with what I would call a 'real' vegetable garden. Last year what we had in our backyard qualified as more of a 'patch' than a garden, but this year, we went nuts and I would say we are officially gardeners. We have 21 tomato plants that are bursting with cherry, plum and beefsteak tomatoes, there is rocket, arugula and spinach, mint, basil and sage, carrots, turnips, parsnips, green beans, peas and last but not least (and this totally feels like the academy awards and like I am forgetting an ever important vegetable growing in my garden) cucumber.

One would think that for someone like me who likes to pickle or preserve almost everything, that I would have chosen to plant mini cucumbers so that I could make pickles. Wrong! I chose to grow regular full size cucumbers and last night we harvested our very first full size cucumber and I made a traditional tomato bread salad with plum tomatoes, basil, cucumber, chick peas, crouton and a dijon balsamic vinagrette. But before I made the salad I need to taste the cucumber on it's own. One wouldn't think there would be much difference between the store bought cucumber and the garden grown (completely pesticide free) cucumber but there is. I can't even put it into words, but it just tastes like summer!

So now that we have a small plot of cucumbers growing I have been searching for interesting recipes where I can put this bounty to good use and I came across this simple yet very delicious sounding recipe where the cucumber still plays a pretty major role and I think I now know what I will be making with cucumber number 2 once it is ready to harvest.

It is on a site that I peruse on a regular basis - Tasty Kitchen as it has a good rating system, different contributors and a great selection.

If I ever have time to have people over for dinner before the snow flies, you may expect this as an appetizer :)