Am I bad?

I made a zucchini dish again. Baked Zucchini with Pancetta & Breadcrumbs.

Which sounds delicious. But you see, I am an omnivore (in theory).

I use this label (though I hate it) not because I eat meat and vegetable, but because I want the culinary world spread at my feet. I want to experience the exotic, taste the unusual. I want to travel to far away lands without even leaving my kitchen. I want it all and I want it on my plate (in theory).

Because (in theory) I am not the kind of person who chooses to limit myself, I can’t imagine, with all that life has to offer, why I would ever say to myself: “Oh, I no longer need those experiences. I am happy with just these experiences.” That’s the point of being an omnivore, right? The choices and experiences should be limitless (in theory).

But (in reality) I am a crappy omnivore. Sometimes I forget to even put meat in the dinner. Heck we eat vegan meals several times a week. Maybe my grocery skills are lacking? Just look inside my shopping bag. Too many of the same old things.

It's summer but it's kind of gray in L.A. The kind of summer gray that makes me crave green.

So this morning I walked down the hill to the Hollywood Farmers Market on the hunt for green. Well the most prominent green of summer is zucchini. If you have ever grown zucchini you realize how much of the summer garden they are willing to take over if you let them. Why let them?

If zucchini is left to do it's thing, 12 pound monster squash would be the result. Those behemoths are fun to look at, but honestly they are not the zucchini of my culinary dreams. Big zucchini can get woody in texture and quite bitter. I like sweet zucchini, which means I look for the smallest zucchini I can find.

Strangely baby zucchini are more prevalent at my Farmers Market during the peak of summer. You'd think the little guys would make their appearance earlier. But I guess as the vine grows the opportunity for zucchini multiplies exponentially. Makes sense. So farmers have lots of little squash and have no qualms about plucking them when they are tiny. Because they know that as long as summer shines there will be more zucchini.

For this week's Market Matters, I went to the Ojai Farmers Market instead of the Hollywood Farmers Market because I spent a wonderfully quiet weekend there, just plain relaxing at the Ojai Valley Inn and Spa. More coming about this weekend soon.

When I arrived home I was tired, feeling lazy (in that way only a weekend at a spa can bring) but hungry. I looked in my bag and saw zucchini. So, it's zucchini soup for dinner. But there are many versions of zucchini soup. I needed a soup to fit the season. Most of the zucchini soup I have enjoyed have really been summer soups. Probably because zucchini is such a 'summer food'. Every gardener in the world knows about late season zucchini. Big like nothing else in the garden. They are prolific and seem to come from nowwhere just as other things in the garden are slowing down. Typically these summer zucchini soups are served cold and creamy.

But this time of year I prefer hot soups. And though zucchini from the garden and at the Farmers Market hasn't peaked as prodigiously as it will within a few months, you can usually find smaller more delicately flavored specimens. They are perfect for simple soups with just a few ingredients. For me this is a 'no cream necessary' soup– even though sour cream or yogurt are fairly traditional in zucchini soup. But I find that yogurt, certainly, and even cream can overpower the taste of baby squash this time of year.