Summer Sweet

The Perfect Summer Lunch.

I know that it's not right to complain about the weather in San Francisco. But, but--here we are, mid-June, and nary a sultry day in sight. No reason for popsicles, for ice cold beer, wedges of watermelon, long evenings by the grill (Well, you could spend a long evening by the grill, but you'd need to wear a jacket, and maybe a hat.) Though I hate to admit it, I really miss summer.

If you head inland a bit, remove yourself from the bay breezes and rolling waves of fog, it's deep, hot, steamy summer. In the Central Valley, in Sacramento--scorching. That means that all of the foods that I've come to associate with the season, like peaches, apricots, pluots, baseball bat-sized zucchinis and, best of all, corn, are still coming from a local source.

Growing up, we'd have big piles of corn on the cob for supper, our sticks of butter bearing the trademark pattern of the ears, which we'd roll to coat. (This is an important question--did your family do the roll to coat method, or were you of the slice-a-pat-and-rub-it-on-the-ear school?). A dozen farm-fresh ears was hardly enough for our family of five. Our all-corn dinner was followed by a big bowl of strawberry shortcake: Sweet nubby biscuits split and filled with softly whipped cream and hulled local berries. Tell me, please--can you imagine a summer supper better than this?

In honor of the season, we had corn for lunch today. Just corn, boiled, buttered, salted and dusted with black pepper. Sarah and I looked at one other, mmming and crunching. For a minute there, it almost felt like summer.