Winter squashes, the tough-skinned ones, usually keep well, but are harder to peel. If you’ve a tried and true way of peeling squash, stick with it. But if the job seems daunting, try tackling it in small bits. Take butternut, for example. First truncate the squash where the neck meets the body. Next slice the body longitudinally in half, then into quarters. Scoop out the seeds. To make small dice for purées and soups, cut each quarter crosswise into ½-inch slices and pare away the skin w...
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The French for garlic is ail, and this week’s recipe if for aioli, a thick emulsion of garlic, oil, and (usually) egg from the Mediterranean. Nowadays you see the name used for all sorts of flavored mayonnaises – wasabi aioli, pomegranate aioli, that sort of thing -- but if it’s not thick as butter and redolent of garlic, it’s just not aioli. 

Aioli

2-5 peeled cloves of garlic, depending on size, pungency, and how much you like garlic
sea-salt, pepper
1 tsp. fine white breadcrumbs (made ...
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Now is also the season for garlic scapes. If you see a jar or basket of green curly things at the market, you are looking at scapes. (Peachtree Circle Farm has also been known to braid them.) Scapes are the “flowering” stalks of hard-neck garlic. Farmers cut the scapes from their garlic plants so the plants don’t divert energy into reproducing. This produces a fatter underground bulb to harvest later in the summer. And it gives us a fleeting seasonal treat in June – a taste of garlic ...
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