Fresh fig, gorgonzola and prosciutto salad with lemon-honey dressing

Dried figs are a year round treat, but when July rolls around I get giddy with anticipation for fresh figs.   Knowing my passion for figs (my blog header tells all) my dear husband gifted me with three trees that are finally producing enough of their precious fruit so that I can satisfy my craving!   I’m a lucky girl!   I’ve beaten the pesky birds and bugs many mornings to enjoy them fresh off the tree, standing in the shade created by their large leaves.  Restraint was difficult, but restrain myself I did!  I saved a batch and made fig ice cream to die for, fig chutney (recipe will come soon) and several fig-inspired salads. 

If you ask me, there is no sweeter or more luscious fruit than a perfectly ripe and juicy black fig.   Technically not a fruit, the fig is actually a flower that is inverted into itself    The skin starts firm and green but ripens to a delicate covering for the pulp within - soft tiny flowers that house its unique nectar.    The skin is actually stem tissue and the pulp is comprised of male and female flower parts with tiny sandy grains that are actually unfertilized ovaries.  The fig was revered by Greek and Roman gods and considered an aphrodisiac and is likened by many a poet to female sexual organs.  Lovely analogy!

Pity me that the season for fresh figs is so short!   Other than their delicious taste, they provide us with numerous benefits:  one cup (149g) contains 58% of the recommended daily allowance (RDA) of dietary fiber!   Also, 38% of RDA of Manganese, an important enzyme activator;  29% of vitamin K for healthy blood clotting;  29% of Potassium for healthy muscles and nerves;  25% Magnesium and Calcium for strong bones, muscles and blood flow.  And if you’re very active, there’s a substantial amount of natural sugar to keep you moving for a long time!

In my salad, piquant gorgonzola cheese is a perfect match for a syrupy fig.   Add savory prosciutto and you have a winning trifecta!

Fresh figs are best eaten or cooked immediately, or refrigerated for a minimal time (I’d say two days max.).    Since figs are so delicate once they ripen, most producers dry them before shipping around the world.

Fig, gorgonzola and prosciutto salad with Honey-lemon dressing

Adapted from a recipe by Jamie Oliver in The Best American Recipes 2003 – 2004.  Serves 4

4 handfuls mixed salad greens

6 ripe fresh figs, any type

8 thin slices prosciutto or Serrano ham

8 fresh basil leaves

4 ounces gorgonzola or other blue cheese of your choice

Place the salad greens in a large bowl. Cut the stems off the figs and slice them in half lengthwise and add to the salad greens. Roll prosciutto into small tube shapes, if desired, and add to the bowl. Add the basil leaves and crumble the blue cheese on top.  Drizzle generously with Honey-lemon dressing.

Honey-lemon dressing

6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon honey

Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Combine all ingredients in a glass jar and shake until well combined.

 

Prijatno!

Fabulous Figs!

Figs 

by D.H. Lawrence

The proper way to eat a fig, in society,

Is to split it in four, holding it by the stump,

And open it, so that it is a glittering, rosy, moist, honied, heavy-petalled four-petalled flower.

Then you throw away the skin

Which is just like a four-sepalled calyx,

After you have taken off the blossom, with your lips.

But the vulgar way

Is just to put your mouth to the crack, and take out the flesh in one bite.

Read the rest of D.H. Lawrence’s freeform poem here but be forewarned – it continues with a luscious description of a fig as female parts!  Peaked your interest, didn’t I?

My blog header is evidence that I am an ardent fig lover.  I cannot resist it’s velvety smooth skin, sweet and succulent flesh, and delicate seeds.  My wine group will attest to the fact that I’ve trespassed and stolen a few during trips to Provence and Oregon!  Knowing this, they generously indulge me during fig season.  Ralph’s latest offering was figs stuffed with Rogue Creamery’s Smokey Blue Cheese wrapped in the thinnest slices of prosciutto.  Here’s Helen, another wine buddy, preparing her fig-based appetizer during a recent wine dinner (recipe below).  Love her for it! 

I was not aware that there are poems about figs, or proper ways to eat a fig, but I must fit in the ‘vulgar’ category!  I usually first take a bite of the entire fig (why trash the skin?) and admire the juicy red flowers inside.  Fresh and ripened on the vine is best, if you can beat the early birds.  And eat soon after harvesting as they sour quickly.

Husbie is experimenting with varieties that grow successfully along the Texas coast.  The recent drought did not bode well for our trees this year but we did manage to harvest enough of the Brown Turkey variety for a grilled pizza with goat cheese, pancetta and freshly ground black pepper.   With a spring salad on the side, you be the judge!

The fig is believed to be the first food source to be cultivated over 11,000 years ago in the Lower Jordan Valley in Israel and it subsequently became a staple for people in the Mediterranean.  It is the first fruit to be mentioned in the Bible and is referenced many times thereafter.  Adam and Eve sewed fig leaves together to make ‘aprons’ (Genesis 3:7).  Seven hundred fig trees in moveable pots in the Figuerie at Versailles were tended so as to satisfy the desires of Louis XIV .  Thanks to the innovative methods used by the head gardener, La Quintinie, the trees were able to supply figs for six months of the year. 

Due to it’s high nutritional content, figs were especially valuable to the athletes in Ancient Greece.  Figs are high in calcium, fiber, potassium and a variety of antioxidants.  Figs were used by the Greeks and Romans to stuff geese so as to fatten their livers.  It was known as ficatum, now foie gras in France.   Oh how I would love to taste a fig-fattened foie gras and compare it to the corn-fed liver.  Helen, what do you say about getting us a couple of geese and some figs…?

 Grilled Figs with Mascarpone, Mint, Port and Prosciutto from Sharing the Vineyard Table by Carolyn Wente and Kimball Jones.

8 fresh figs

¼ cup non-vintage port

3 tablespoons mascarpone

4 very thin slices prosciutto

4 large mint leaves, for garnish

Cut off the ends of the figs and split in half lengthwise. Macerate in the port for an hour. Prepare a small fire in your grill and cook the figs for a moment on each side, just enough to warm the figs and give them a smoky flavor. They should remain firm. Spoon or pipe the mascarpone onto the cut sides of the figs, dividing it evenly. Cut the prosciutto into sixteen 1-inch wide strips. Wrap around the figs. Place on a serving platter. Slice the mint into very thin strips (chiffonade) and sprinkle over the figs.

The beautiful earthenware you see in these pictures are my sister’s fig plates in Oiseau Bleu by Gien. You’ll be seeing more of this striking collection in future posts, I’m sure. 

To end, here’s a silly limerick by Edward Lear that will describe me later in life (hopefully!):

There was an Old Person of Ischia,
Whose conduct grew friskier and friskier;
He danced hornpipes and jigs,
     and ate thousands of figs,
That lively Old Person of Ischia.

Prijatno!

Twittering and a blue cheese dressing

It all began with the chirping of chimney swifts in the chimney during the storm last night, and a cacophony of mocking birds twittering at the crack of dawn this morning.  I should be complimentary to my feathered friends because they did make pretty music, but I wasn’t quite ready to emerge from my sweet slumber!  The twittering must have been a sign…

I don’t have a picture of my outdoor twitters, but here’s a cutie from my Delft jar:

Later this morning, I read my dear neighbor Carolina’s blog.  Her remarkable husband, Gabe, was her guest blogger.  I’m not complimenting him only because he helps me with my computer issues;  he is also very smart and a wonderful husband and father.  After reading his entertaining post about the dubious cuisine of Nigeria (he works there on rotation), I followed a link to his blog and before I knew it, I became a Twitterer  -  not to be confused with Twit, OK?!    

Twittering is taking over as the new form of social communication.  Snippets (140 characters or less) of information are sent by the ‘twitter’ to followers in the cyber world and if the service is also connected to their cell phones, it’s transferred immediately.  Oprah has over half a million followers!  President Obama ‘twittered’ during the campaign and Lance Armstrong ‘tweets’ several times a day.  One of NASA’s astronauts will tweet about his training for an upcoming mission.  No news on whether he will be tweeting from space, though.  Time Magazine and CNN tweet to thousands of followers about news updates as they occur.   As you can see, the possibilities are endless!

On to the subject of food!  A couple of days ago I made a delicious blue cheese dressing and served it on a wedge of iceberg lettuce.  The ‘wedge’ salad has been all the rage the last few years, but I could barely finish it – the iceberg was tasteless and watery and simply not worthy of the blue cheese.  Perhaps the lowly iceberg’s role should remain a supporting one:  to complement the spice in chalupas and tacos, and add crunch and balance to a salty BLT  (in my most humble opinion, of course).

Yesterday, I composed a salad worthy of the remainder of the blue cheese dressing: curly red tip lettuce, avocado slices, hickory smoked bacon, and slices of ripe, juicy pears and radishes.  All of that was topped with snipped chives and freshly ground pepper. 

The dressing is thick, so I suggest you leave some moisture on the lettuce after you rinse it.  That way, when you toss the salad, the consistency will be perfect.  The pictures were taken before I tossed the salad, hence the mounds of dressing.  It would be great as a dip for veggies and crackers as well.

Blue Cheese Dressing from The Best American Recipes 2003-2004

1/2 cup mayonnaise

½ cup sour cream

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

½ cup crumbled blue cheese 

Stir mayonnaise and sour cream together.  Add Worcestershire sauce and blue cheese. Use a fork to mash the blue cheese to blend it in, leaving some chunks.  Keep refrigerated until use.

All a-twitter,

Prijatno!