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Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Cucumber salad: a recipe

Cucumber salad
My stockpile of cooking / eating / lifestyle magazines is starting to take over my life.

For a while, I had a really great system: I only subscribed to Cooking Light so, at the end of each year, I would buy the recipe compilation book and recycle all the magazines. Less space, no waste.

Ah, the simple days.

Getting all ninja-like means that I now subscribe to seven different magazines which provide my recipe fodder. The result is that I have stacks and stacks of magazines piled up in my kitchen. And family room. Ugh.

(One of my goals is to figure out some really kick-ass way to organize the recipes into some kick-ass online system. Yeah, I'll let you know when I get around to that.)

The magazines are all good in different ways so I am loathe to purge. However, I did decide last year that one had to be sacrificed: Sunset. The magazine of Living in the West. Which I don't do anymore. Not since 2004. The articles about how to desert garden and fun places to take weekend roadtrips in Arizona and California just weren't cutting it for me anymore, given that I live about a gajillion miles in the other direction.

So Sunset got the axe. Sniff.

However, Sunset is sorely missed for its excellent, excellent recipes. Luckily, many of them may be found online or in the many Sunset compilation books.

Or in the towering stack of back issues in my kitchen.

Cucumber Salad with Spicy Yogurt Dressing (adapted from Sunset magazine)

Ingredients
2/3 cup plain, non-fat greek yogurt
3/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/8 teaspoon ground turmeric
1 English cucumber, diced
2 tablespoons minced shallot (about 1 or 2)
1/4 mint leaves, chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions
In a bowl, whisk together the first six ingredients. Sitr in the remaining ingredients and season to taste with salt and pepper.

Note: If you double the amount of dressing, use half of it to marinate some chicken breasts at room temperature for about 10-15 minutes, then grill.

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