In this humidity, everything tastes better in popsicle-form. Start with these foolproof combos, then go crazy.
One afternoon, when I was a boy, my neighbor walked over to the corner of her yard where I was digging with her son and held out a funny-looking ice tray. She was a short and squat French woman who I’d become used to offering me foods I didn’t eat at home. This time, it was a popsicle. Made from orange juice. Blew my mind. I must’ve slurped down three or four of them. Naturally, I went home and emptied a carton of OJ into a couple of ice trays—they were all we had. Orange juice ice cubes are nothing like orange juice popsicles. It was an important day in my maturation. —Scott Edwards
Recipes and photography by Yelena Strokin
Currant Popsicles
(Pictured, top) Serves six.
2 cups vanilla Greek yogurt
2 cups red or black currants
(or a combination of both)
2 tsps. honey or agave
1 tbsp. lemon juice
Strawberry Smoothie Popsicles Serves six.
1 cup vanilla Greek yogurt
2 cups fresh strawberries, sliced
2 tsps. honey or agave
1 tbsp. lemon juice
Mango Popsicles Serves six.
½ cup heavy cream
3 mangos
1 tsp. honey
Juice from half a lime
The directions are the same for all three popsicles: Add everything to a blender, then puree the mixture until it achieves a smooth consistency. Pour it into a popsicle tray, plant a popsicle stick in each mold and freeze for at least four hours.
Mango-Strawberry Popsicles
(Pictured, right) Serves six.
1 mango
2 cups fresh strawberries, sliced
2 tsps. honey
Juice from one orange
Juice from one grapefruit
Add the mango, orange juice and 1 tsp. of honey to a blender and puree the mixture until it achieves a smooth consistency. Then, spoon it into a popsicle tray, filling each mold halfway.
Puree the strawberries, grapefruit juice and 1 tsp. of honey next, and top off the molds. Plant a popsicle stick in each, then freeze for at least four hours.
Yelena Strokin is a Newtown-based food stylist and photographer and the founder of the blog Cooking Melangery.com.
I can’t say I’ve ever met a whiskey that I haven’t liked, and I’ve met a lot of whiskeys. But never one like Amador’s 10-Barrel. Hits of citrus, toffee, clove, leather and hoppy spice weave together to create a bottomless complexity. The limited release is 60 percent straight malt whiskey sourced from high-end distillers and 40 percent hop-flavored whiskey distilled from Bear Republic Brewery’s Racer 5 IPA. The beer’s full-bodied flavor contributes a malty hoppy-ness without overwhelming the whiskey’s flavor profile. The components were aged separately for over two years in French oak wine barrels before they were combined and aged for another couple of years in chardonnay barrels. You taste every day of that.
On a lighter note, I’m not big on fruity beers, but Free Will Brewing Company’s Mango Wheat has just enough of a mango overtone to keep it refreshing. It also happens to pair really well with some of my favorite summer foods: ceviche, crab and corn.
ADAM JUNKINS Partner/Sommelier Sovana Bistro
(Kennett Square)
The present has a hard time holding our attention anymore. We live in a click-and-swipe culture. If you don’t like what you see, move on to the next page. There’s a price to pay for that, of course: never truly appreciating what we have. But the challenge to stay on top—and, for the most ambitious among us, ahead—of it all tends to run right over those concerns. Because we’re in the business of stoking that very fire, we asked around to find out what we’ll be pining for next. Here’s what we heard back.
“Ceramics are becoming more accessible. Lauren Mabry, her pieces, for being fine artwork, are not ridiculously expensive. And they’re beautiful. She really thinks of her ceramics as paintings. Roberto Lugo tells the story of his life through his ceramics. They’re functional pieces—teapots, jars—but they’re fine artwork. Edgewood Made is very simplistic, functional, but also high design.” Rachel Zimmerman
“Small spaces that live large. People are obsessed with this concept lately. Everyone wants to streamline, from empty nesters to student loan-burdened millennials, in no small part because efficiency no longer means cramped. More thoughtful designs, like floor-to-ceiling windows and vaulted ceilings painted white, can make a space feel much larger than it is.” Lisa Furey
“We’re seeing a desire to create a sense of place through sustainable landscapes. We’re always considering the existing framework of a site, public or private, so that we can incorporate the natural elements as organically as possible. And we’re collaborating with local fabricators and artisans. It’s just as important to us that the fiber of the community be represented in our designs.” David Fierabend
“We’re selling oil paintings that are painted on reclaimed metal. They range in size from four feet by five feet to six by eight. The more oversized, the faster they go. Same for another collection of simple phrases, like “I Love Us,” painted on five foot-tall canvases. The more white space, the more versatile they are.” Tracey and Rod Berkowitz
“There’s now so much access to the digital world that people are becoming desensitized and the focus is shifting to creating what’s not readily available on the Internet. I’ve been featuring a lot of bespoke furniture in my designs. It’s specific to someone and it’s an instant heirloom.” Michele Plachter
“My weakness is vintage ephemera and really unique collectibles. In such a digitally driven world, I love incorporating maps, globes, antique books, prints, photographs and postcards into my home. They’re so tangible. And they speak of another time completely. I love to imagine the stories behind them. Having these things in my home brings a warmth that you just don’t get from an imported knickknack. My new favorite resource for such things is the N3rd Collective, in Old City, which is comprised of Hoof & Antler, freshvintage and Scout Salvage & Vintage Rescue, all longtime Clover vendors.” Janet Long
“More artists are experimenting with side collections, taking the skills that they have and creating a business. You’re still buying something that’s fine art as long as it’s treated in a way and editioned in a way that it’s still considered fine art, but it may not be at the same price point.” Rachel Zimmerman
“Pinot noir has been popular for a while now—since Sideways, at least—but lately I’ve struggled to keep it in stock. The New York Times featured Oregon pinot back in early January, which seemed to trigger a renewed interest in all regions.” Adam Junkins
“Materials are changing a lot. Lyn Godley, for example, is using fiber optics. They’re photographs that are printed and then hand-colored, and then they’re embedded with fiber optics. So the light is really subtle, and it adds dimensionality to the piece.” Rachel Zimmerman
“The craft beer crowd has been pushing for higher alcohol content-brews for the last few years, but the trend seems to be reversing. Interest is gaining by the week in the more easy-drinking ‘session beers.’ They’re lower in alcohol but every bit as flavorful, if not more so, than the stronger beers.” Adam Junkins
“We’re drawn, right now, to industrial pieces from England, France and Belgium as much for the quality as their look. In particular, we can’t keep ‘crank tables’ in the store. (They’re tables with industrial bases and manually-adjustable table heights.) For good reason; they’re great looking and crazy-versatile. We’ve also been bringing in a lot more unusual upholstered pieces as of late—midcentury with a bit of a twist. We have an amazing wing/egg chair in the store that’s half leather, half quilted linen. And, oversized, dramatic lighting—imagine a huge glass chandelier over a crank table.” Tracey and Rod Berkowitz
“Lately, we’ve been doing all kinds of fermentation and preserving. We’ve been routinely making crème fraîche, kimchi and yogurt for sometime now. But we began playing with those concepts in different ways that fall well outside the norm, like fruit kimchi, which could offer an entirely different way to approach the condiment, potentially as a dessert. We’re also tinkering with using fermentation and yeasts as flavoring components. Curing has become a standard for many things here. Lardo, bacon, venison, egg yolks and various cabbages and fruits are curing at any given time. We’ve always loved making cured egg yolks, which have an amazing, cheese-like consistency. But now we’re looking into how we can safely and usefully ferment them over a longer period of time.” Andrew Kochan
“The ceiling has officially come off the craft cocktail movement. There are so many resources available anymore, between books and sites, that almost anything is possible. Barrel-aged coffee-pecan bitters, you think, would really elevate your go-to whiskey cocktail. Chances are, someone else had the same thought, or one close enough to it. Hop online, and within a few clicks you’ll find a barrel and a recipe.” Adam Junkins
“There’s a blending of the science and art worlds. A lot of jewelry now is 3D-casted, and I think that’s benefitted both the artist and the collector. It allows someone like Doug Bucci to do more pieces at a time because there’s not as much handwork involved, which, in turn, lowers the price.” Rachel Zimmerman
“Moroccan pillows and throws with lots of interesting patterns and textures can create a beautiful juxtaposition with simple accessories.” Tracey and Rod Berkowitz
[divider]Our Experts[/divider]
Rachel Zimmerman is the founder and director of InLiquid Art & Design, a nonprofit hub for close to 300 visual artists in and around Philly. Come June, it’ll host the wildly popular Art for the Cash Poor sale, where budding collectors can stock up on pieces priced under 200 bucks.
David Fierabend is the owner and lead landscape architect with the Hopewell, New Jersey-based Groundswell Design Group, which has been busy (a severe understatement) greening up all corners of the city, between the Spruce Street Harbor Park, beer gardens in Center City and the forthcoming Pearl Street art initiative.
Lisa Furey is the owner and designer of Barefoot Interiors, in Bala Cynwyd. She was featured last year by HGTV as part of its “Fresh Faces of Design” portfolio in recognition of a 690-square foot, farmhouse-style cottage she designed in South Carolina’s Low Country.
Michele Plachter is the owner and designer of Michele Plachter Design, in Center City. She specializes in modernizing residential interiors. Her influence reaches from Washington Square to Villanova, Mount Airy to Newtown Square.
Adam Junkins is our resident mixologist. He’s also a partner and the sommelier at Sovana Bistro in Kennett Square.
Andrew Kochan is a co-owner and -executive chef of University City’s Marigold Kitchen, which consistently proves itself to be one of the most forward-thinking (and secretive) kitchens around. It currently holds down the 14-spot in Philadelphia magazine’s compilation of the 50 best restaurants in the city.
Janet Long is the founder and director of The Clover Market, which has become the launching pad for every indie home goods and accessories label across the region. She’s so beloved that even after the designers establish themselves, they continue to show at Clover.
Tracey and Rod Berkowitz are the owners (and scavengers) of the always-inventive vintage home goods store zinc home + garden, in Lambertville, NJ. They have an uncanny knack for reimagining decades-old industrial fixtures as the touchstones of a modern home.
Photo: Composition of enclosed cylinders,” 2015, by Lauren Mabry. Photo courtesy of Lauren Mabry
Even now, especially now, when everything’s fresh and within easy reach, less is more.
We hear it all the time these days from chefs of every walk: Keep it simple. Have faith in the ingredients. But that’s easy to say when you’ve been formally schooled and challenged by an elite mentor. For the rest of us, keeping it simple looks like a lot of disparate (and under-seasoned) ingredients spread across a plate. The trick isn’t just keeping the complicated techniques to a minimum, it’s also keeping the ingredients to a minimum. With almost everything in season right now, the tendency is to pick the garden clean and make it all somehow work together. But it won’t, and it never will, no matter how fresh everything is. Think smaller and lighter. It’s how you really want to eat when you’re not doing it with your eyes. Three to five ingredients tops, and they should all complement each other, as they do here in this bright salad and hearty sandwich. This time of year, if it takes longer to make than it does to eat, you’re overthinking it.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Add the olive oil to a skillet and warm it over a medium heat. Cut the mushrooms into thin slices, then stir them in. Reduce the heat to low and cook them until they’re soft and blackened.
In a small bowl, mix together the mayo and the garlic. Spread it across one side of each bread slice. Then add a piece of Swiss to one of those slices. On top of that, layer the cucumber, avocado and mushroom. Top it with a handful of microgreens and the other slices of cheese and bread.
Place the sandwich in the oven just long enough for the cheese to begin melting, about three to five minutes. Then move it to a cutting board and cut it diagonally—because sandwiches always taste better when they’re cut diagonally.
Cabbage and Beet Salad Serves one.
For the salad
½ medium head of green cabbage, thinly sliced
1 medium carrot, peeled and grated
3-4 small beets, peeled and grated
¼ bunch scallions, finely chopped
For the dressing
2 tbsps. lemon juice
2 tbsps. avocado oil
1 tsp. dry-roasted tomatoes
1 tsp. dry dill
Salt and white pepper to taste
Sugar to taste
To make the dressing, in a small bowl, whisk together the lemon juice, dry-roasted tomatoes, dill, sugar, salt and pepper. Once it’s thoroughly mixed, whisk in the avocado oil. Set the dressing aside at that point to allow the flavors to marry. After about 10 minutes, taste it and season accordingly with salt and pepper.
In a large bowl, toss together the cabbage, carrot, beets and scallions. Add the dressing, then toss once more.
Yelena Strokin is a Newtown-based food stylist and photographer and the founder of the blog melangery.com.
[divider]What I’m Drinking Right Now[/divider]
Sangria Makes about 15 portions.
1 pint fresh blueberries
1 pint fresh strawberries
2 medium apples, diced small*
2 oranges, peeled, seeded and diced small*
1 large cucumber, peeled and diced into quarter-inch chunks
12 medium to large basil leaves, chiffonade
12 medium to large mint leaves, chiffonade
1 bottle Art in the Age Rhubarb Tea Liqueur
3 bottles crisp white wine (pinot grigio or sauvignon blanc)
1 bottle moscato d’asti (or another semisweet sparkling wine)
* These ingredients can be swapped out for just about any other seasonal fruit you prefer. Peaches, nectarines and cherries all work especially well, too.
Combine all of the ingredients, save for the wine, cover/seal and let it sit overnight. The next day, add the wine and stir well.
Ladle the sangria, along with a healthy helping of the fruit, into a wine glass or goblet filled with ice. Top with two to three ounces of the moscato d’asti.
Barbeque Pairings
Stocking the bar for a barbeque is a little more complicated than it first seems. Cold beer and white wine—no brainer. Until an old-school southerner (or wannabe) slips in and you’re caught without brown spirits. Load up on these and you’ll be loved by all comers. —AJ
Wine Vinho verde
It’s a dry, super-acidic wine from Portugal. Big on citrus flavor, low on alcohol (about nine percent). And at 10 bucks a bottle, it encourages a generous pour.
SpiritsJ.M. Rhum Agricole Vieux 10-year-old
Imagine nursing this smoky, leathery, bourbon barrel-aged rum while you man those ribs, and tell me your mouth doesn’t water at the thought.
