That actually happened. I never thought it would, but it was 35 Celcius for about a week and I didn’t have air conditioning. I do have systems in place, like reading at the Chapters on Ste-Catherine Street in the slightly air-conditioned basement, and spending time in the McGill Library where the cost of air conditioning is keeping them from ever being able to lower tuition fees. BYO-sweater unless you’re a woman who has been sleeping with an ice pack on her chest and another under her feet. Then you certainly don’t need or want a sweater.
The other thing you don’t want is food, which is why it was such a good thing I discovered a juicer in my house. It makes an espresso cup of juice at a time (it can make more, but you can’t fit a cup larger than an espresso cup under the opening, so you need to do small quantities at a time and then transfer it to a bigger glass). I ended up overflowing my espresso cup on multiple occasions, and slurping cucumber juice off the kitchen counter.
Straight up cucumber juice was my favourite. I never thought I’d like it, but Cafe Sardine showed me the ways of cucumber juice. There they make their own soda with their own carbonated soda water and a siphon I assume. The chef and the co-owner both say they go through a heck of a lot of cucumbers. It’s ridiculously sweet, this soda, but just cucumber without the sugar is perfectly refreshing.
So that’s what I did – I juiced a lot of cucumbers. Then I waited 20 minutes and ate the cucumber pulp. I did peel the cucumbers, though, because those are tough. The waiting 20 minutes is to let the juice digest easily first without getting bogged down in the fibre. But then I didn’t want to waste the fibre. Lots of people just compost it. Sardine uses the peels for something that ends up tasting like deep-fried seaweed. I think they have a bit of a cucumber fetish in that restaurant, actually, since they pickle some cucumber insides too. Should there ever be a drought that destroys cucumbers everywhere, Sardine will fail. Or they’ll just have to convince the health crowd that would otherwise opt for cucumber sodas to switch to their lime donuts. Fortunately for now it’s cucumber season, so they’re even getting local produce by the truckload, and they’re small, a little sweet, not too watery, and delicious.
Once the juicer is out, you might as well make a day of it. It’s annoying to clean all the pieces. So I tried keeping things as non-sweet as possible. Mostly vegetables with just a touch of acidic fruit. Something like 1 cucumber, 1 branch of celery (for salt), and a quarter of a mango. Or two branches of celery, a handful of spinach, and the juice of half an orange. You’d be surprised how delicious these were. I didn’t go ultra bitter with too much parsley.
But the best and simplest was just cucumber juice with some fresh mint on top. No sugar, nothing complicated. If it sounds monastic, try it for yourself, meet me, and then just try to call me a nun. I dare you.
Cucumber Juice
3 Lebanese cucumbers, or 1 large cucumber
1 juicer
3 leaves of fresh mint
Juice cucumber in juicer. If you’ve never done this before, figure it out. (That’s a great instructions, isn’t it?) Generally you push the fruit (cucumber is a fruit – it has seeds) or vegetable down through the opening using some kind of solid piece of the appliance. Watch that you don’t overflow the receptacle of the juice. Who messes up juicing besides me? Nobody. Garnish with mint. Drink immediately. Juice degrades in nutrients the longer you let it sit. Feel cleansed. Clean machine. Or wait 20 minutes and eat cucumber pulp. Then clean machine. Or leave it and make more juice. Raspberries are in season…a little raspberry with some mint and celery thinned with coconut water…hmm…leave out the cucumber on that one, I think. Maybe.
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