It was a good year for peas. We planted snow peas with the intention of eating them with stir-fries and other Asian dishes. That didn’t happen very often. Instead we devoured most of the snow peas raw, in salads and snacking them on their own. They were that good.
All good things come to an end, though. Peas are one of the first seeds we planted, one of the first plants to germinate, one of the first ready to harvest. Their spring cycle is relatively short. By mid-summer, the pea plants wilted and scorched under the hot summer sun.
This was our last meal of snow peas.
It’s not the end of the garden however. We’ve got miles to go. Thank heaven.
As a sign of goodwill, the last of the peas coincided with the first of the green beans. We have two favorite ways to prepare green beans. One is stir-fried green beans with garlic. It’s simple to make and zestier with a splash of soy sauce added to the pan in the last minute.
The second method is new to me. On a dvd of Julia Child‘s long-running pbs television series The French Chef, she prepares green beans in the French method: clean the beans and leave them whole; plunge them into a large pot of boiling water for 2 or 3 minutes; rinse them in cold water immediately; then just before serving, saute them in butter for a minute or two. This method makes a fabulous dish.
