So healthy! So refreshing! So crisp & juicy!
Inspired by @ottawaoperadiva’s post in WFD I thought the cucumber deserves some attention.
I love them just ‘as is,’ with a little salt sprinkled on top — as a summer snack or lazy side with Abendbrot, but there are so many ways to eat them: cucumber salads (vinegar or creamy dill dressing), horiatiki, Chinese smashed cuke salad, tzatziki, cacık, pickles, braised cukes, stuffed cukes…
What are your favorite ways with cucumbers?
I like cukes best in a salad. Greek salads are hands down my favourite but I also like tabouli and panzanella. During the winter when I am not overloaded with CSA vegetables to finish up, I will sometimes make cream cheese and cucumber sandwiches.
Almost every which way, just really rather it not cooked/warm.
In the summer I also make a cold “soup” (blend with kefir/yoghurt or both). I do the same with radishes and Spargel.
Yes, they’re great in chilled soups with yogurt or labneh or even sour cream & lots n lots of dill 
My mom used to love Schmorgurken — they seem to be different from your garden variety cuke & meant to be cooked. She usually made a beef stuffing and braised them.
I don’t care for warm cukes either.
I mostly make tzatziki and Hungarian -style cucumber salad.
I also like Southern style.
I also like okroshka.
Favourite as part of a chopped Middle Eastern (or Eastern Mediterranean) style salad, with radish, tomato, onion, peppers, etc.
It’s been quite a nice day here, so we had lunch on the patio. Strips of cuke, carrot, spring onion, radish and tomato. Leftover pork souvlaki. And the leftovers of a sauce that I made for with the pork - Greek yoghurt, mayo, a little honey and quite a lot of English mustard. The sound of birds and the smell of phlox completed a lovely hour.
I usually make the smashed cucumber salad too - so easy. I love seedless cukes chopped into my salads. Otherwise, I do like just eating them with some hummus or other (non-ranch) dip too.
My cousin eats the fresh picked cukes (after a quick wash), with a heavy shake of salt. Really simple.
You just reminded me that on my first trip to Japan, I met up with a friend who had went home to visit family a few weeks. He took me on a eatery crawl (so to speak), and he also took me to one of those oden carts that are out on the streets later in the evening during Fall/Winter. One of the things they served was a fresh cucumber chopped into chunks and sprinkled with a bit of salt and msg. Was quite tasty!
Ohhhh, I haven’t had these in ages!
I mostly use cukes in either composed salads or with tomatoes and feta with a balsamic drizzle. Once I made Julia Child’s Baked Cucumbers. They were…interesting. But not interesting enough for me to make them again.
And if you can’t open a PDF:
I think the NYT just had a brief article (or part of a NYT cooking recipe) about cucumbers being sold as street snacks in Japan.
This looks good.
Here’s a Czech recipe
How about some California rolls?? In my case, these are Kalifornia Rolls – made with Krab (imitation crab). Or other sushi rolls made with cucumbers.
Greek salad.
Gazpacho.
Raita (tzatziki).
Pickled.
Sliced in a sandwich.
Cold and crispy - never cooked, warmed, or smashed.
Not my favorite maki, but I also don’t think of those as warm food. Like, I don’t remember ever having a maki that was warm in a way that it also made the cucumber warm…
I do like sake & cuke, or sake, avo & cuke maki.
Yours look great!
A local Sichuan restaurant offers a smashed cuke salad as a starter. Lots of garlic & chilli. I understand it’s a traditional dish of the region.
Our favorite Sichuan place in town where I used to host my chili head gatherings made The Best rendition of this salad. Every other version I’ve had of it elsewhere has not lived up to this gold standard. It was by far one of my favorite dishes there.
My favourite? Schmorgurken made sweet and sour and cooked with bacon. Eaten with boiled potatoes. I used to hate them as a child, but I really love them now.
I soured on cukes for a long time–skin too tough, too many seeds–but then I discovered Persian cucumbers. Few to no seeds, and a thin skin that doesn’t need peeling. Their only problem is they’re more perishable than “normal” cucumbers.
You will have to eat them faster! There’s lots of good ideas in this thread…
