Holding on to Summer: Easy Pickled Radishes and Pickled Green Beans

I refuse to believe that summer just passed me by this year.  In the blink of an eye, I missed those bright sunny days, sandy trips to the beach, and backyard barbecues.  I could tell you that I don't know how it happened, but really it was just my all-consuming dissertation; I dug in to get the job done, and when you are glued to your computer and working night and day, you barely notice the happenings in the outside world.   

Looking back, it seems a small sacrifice to completely give up one summer of my life in order to close the door on my PhD.  But that is my rational mind speaking - my heart is trying to do the impossible by tugging me back to mid-summer.  It aches for long days without a care, backyard grilling with friends, and plump heirloom tomatoes.  These days, my poor little heart seems surprised to notice that the air is cooler and the days are shorter.  The summer vegetables are beginning to be in scarce supply at the farmers markets as everyone snatches up the last summer corn or brightly colored zucchini.  And since my heart is stubbornly refusing to acknowledge the arrival of fall, I think I can indulge it for just a few more weeks and try to hang on to the last remnants of summer as best as I can. 

So I have been eating ungodly amounts of sweet tomatoes; I grilled corn when I went camping with my sister; and I baked sugary treats with the remaining summer berries.  None of those meals or desserts ended up here on The Cilantropist, because I needed some time to myself to get back in touch with my kitchen, and just cook.  It is so therapeutic and relaxing for me.  But then I decided it was time to grab some of these bright summer veggies and pickle them, and I knew I had to share these with you.    

Foodbuzz Festival: The Food

Hi there friends!  Can I offer you an apology?  I seem to have been completely absent from my blog for almost one and a half weeks now, ack!  So sorry to have left you all alone, but not to fear, I am alive and well, I have not been gobbled up by a woman-eating monster, and I have a few reasons for being away.  First, I was completely caught up making my video for Project Food Blog (yesssss!  I did advance to the next round and will share my next VIDEO entry with you this week!) and I am SO excited about it.  I can't wait for you to see it!  Immediately after finishing my video, I jetted up to San Francisco for a weekend of eating, socializing, and general debauchery at Foodbuzz's Second Annual Food Blogger Festival. 


The weekend was filled with events (and of course my tummy was filled with food) and I got to experience it all with both new and old friends.  I have loads that I want to tell you about, but I thought I would break it down into The Food and The People.  And really, for The Food, I just want to tell you about the Taste Pavilion from Saturday afternoon (I may have been too preoccupied with those aformentioned People on Friday night to take any real notice of what I was eating) and share some details about several amazing new food vendors and local food craftsmen that I discovered.   

The Taste Pavilion was located at City View at the Metreon, and the venue couldn't have been more perfect.  The space indoors was large enough to so that all 350 of us bloggers could comfortably weave around and eat to our hearts content, and then outside there was ample space to breathe in some fresh air, bask in the sunshine, and take in the scenery.  

Foodbuzz did a fabulous job of organizing a variety of excellent vendors and local food craftsmen for the Taste Pavilion, and I think there were only a few that I might have missed out on.  Almost all the food and wine I got to sample exceeded my expectations (and I am a tough critic!), but I had a few favorites that I just had to tell you about.   

It's a Pickle Party!

PICKLES!  Pickles, pickles, pickles!!!  Oh how I love them.  Just thinking about pickles makes me want to do a happy dance, so just use your imagination to conjure up your best of image of what I do when I actually eat one.  And just look at the word "pickle," doesn't it make you want to giggle?  

Pickles have been a favorite food of mine since childhood when I used to eat them by the jar.  Literally.  (As I mentioned before, I am not sure how my mom let me get away with this, or how my stomach could handle digesting an entire jar of pickles.  Children are tough.)  I would eat all varieties of pickles: Kosher, zesty dill, bread and butter, spears, hamburger slices, and especially those giant deli pickles that they pull out of the huge glass jar at the local sandwich shop.  No dill spear was safe from the voracious appetite of The Little Cilantropist.  Pickles are an old-fashioned food that I associate with home, and comfort, and a casual, fun sort of eating, and it looks like I am not alone. 

Now that I am all grown up (or at least I am often seen masquerading as an adult), I still eat pickles with gusto, although not by the jarful any longer.  Instead, I get my fix through pedestrian supermarket-variety pickles and dill spears that accompany the occasional sandwich or cheeseburger when I eat out.  Since I think I am a pickle addict at heart, I began to wonder if this was really enough pickle-eating to get by.  You see, I have recently felt like something was missing in my life, and I think that thing is The Pickle.  

Notice that I used a few capital letters there when I referred to The Pickle.  I did that on purpose, to specifically delineate the olive-green, less-than-crunchy, Vlasic-type pickle, from The Bright-Green, Full-of-Flavor, Homemade-Type Pickle.  In fact, these homemade pickles really shouldn't even share the same name as those knock-offs crowding the shelves of giant supermarket chains; but alas, a pickle by any other name might not really be a pickle at all (plus, I don't actually have any power or influence to change the names of foods), so for now these are Pickles with a capital P.