Early Summer Pico de Gallo: A CSA Study

This month our CSA has started again! It is so much fun to go pick up fresh vegetables every week - I really missed having a refrigerator crowded with local produce over the winter. While the first couple of weeks are generally loaded with greens, we ended up with some lovely spring onions this week, so I thought I'd use them in a pico de gallo.

Generally, my pico de gallo recipe consists of fresh tomatoes, red onion, garlic, cilantro or basil, and salt and pepper. Maybe a jalepeno if there's one lying around, but otherwise very simple. With these spring onions on hand, I decided to play with the flavors a bit and use them instead of the red onions.

We also got garlic scapes in the CSA - the flavorful part of the garlic plant that can be found for just a few weeks a year (before the flower moves all the way up the stem and/or the farmer cuts off the scape). Instead of the garlic cloves I usually use, I thought I'd just use the scape for a little bit of a brighter flavor.

In addition to the usual cilantro, I threw in a few leaves of mint to change things up a bit, since I got a ton of it in the CSA as well. One thing I learned in the cooking classes I took two years ago was the classic mantra "what grows together goes together." The tomatoes may have been a little off-season, but everything else had not only grown together, but grown together on the same farm. And what do you know, the mantra was right and this pico was absolutely delicious!

Early Summer Pico de Gallo

2 tomatoes, diced
6-8 spring onions, diced
1 teaspoon of garlic scapes, minced
1 tablespoon cilantro, finely chopped
2-3 mint leaves, finely chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

Combine ingredients. Taste for salt and pepper, and add a dash of hot sauce if you'd like a spicier dish. It is best to let the pico de gallo meld in the fridge for a couple of hours before serving.