Do you recall that episode of The Simpson’s when poor, clumsy Homer somehow manages to make the barbecue pit explode in a violent flash of flame? Naturally he’s freaked out because the only “summer food” he can wrap his brain around comes from the grill.

The look of sadness that crosses his face as he realizes his precious red meat burgers went up in flames is classically Homer! But, there are even bigger laughs ahead as little Lisa Simpson waltzes in carrying a great big bowl of something cold, red and soupy-looking– while merrily announcing: “Good news! You don’t have to eat meat! I’ve got enough gazpacho for everyone!”

Good laughs, I say. But little Lisa’s gazpacho imagination seems a bit limited. I think the soup she presents to the assorted gathering of Springfield’s oddball population is the rather generic Andalusian-style gazpacho. It is chock-full of tomatoes and cucumbers and is thoroughly associated these days with Spain.

Now I am not knocking Lisa’s gazpacho – I'm sure it's a wonderfully flavored, cold soup full of fresh healthy vegetables. I bet it tastes like a “chunky liquid salad”, just as it should.

But if we look at the roots and origins of gazpacho I think we'll find that originally gazpacho was neither Spanish nor made from tomatoes and cucumber.

I usually pop right out of bed in the morning. Sometimes as early as 5 a.m. all revved up and ready to go. But sometimes it is hard to get it together on Sunday morning. You see, I meant to get an early start to the Hollywood Farmers Market today, but let's just say Mr. Vintner's Grape got a hold of me at a dinner party last night. So I am a wee bit behind schedule.

Still, when I finally got down there I was very surprised to see that there has been a transition in the market from spring produce to summer crops. The stone fruits are starting to come in. Stone fruits are those with pits, like peaches, plums, and apricots. We get them a bit earlier than most of the country, and there was definitely a party-like atmosphere in celebration of their arrival at the market. I have been meaning to do a big luscious tart using these fruits, but today is just not the day. I couldn't possibly focus on pastry dough!

So, due to my slowed down mood I picked a vegetable that takes almost no preparation to be at its best and it also makes an early appearance in Southern California. I chose yellow wax beans.

The variety I chose is an Italian heirloom. It is flatter than the more common yellow wax bean that looks exactly like a green bean, but is, well, yellow. The window of availability for the flatter Italian variety is very brief. So I moved it to the front of the line.