Fennel

This week there was a single petite fennel on the very top of my veggie share and I was glad to see it. I do love a complex vegetable. The bulb is crisp and crunchy giving a whiff of clean, cool celery and the fronds are perfumey and sweet-savory, tasting of anise and green vegetal spice. I love it, obviously but I only came to know of it in college. There is typically not much call for fennel in traditional Texas home cooking but, never mind. My first recollection of fennel is one of scent. I minored in Italian in school and my most memorable instructor, Professore Gaudelini, of the big hazel eyes and curly dark hair  wore a fennel scented cologne. Naturally, female attendance was high. Later in college while traveling in France one summer I found that fragrance again in vegetable form growing in gardens and wild along the side of the road and on the table during many meals. I ate fennel once in a memorable soup of creamed white beans, wine and garlic. It was delicious. On another trip to France around Christmastime my husband and I stopped inside the door of a tiny shop that sold only the juices of fresh fruits and vegetables which the shopkeeper bottled on site for each customer. I watched as he fed small, tart green apples, fennel  and grapefruits into his machine and the frothy golden juice bubbled out. I think I told my husband that it was time for us to move to France after that. If anyone has a juicer at home I would love to know what that juice tastes like, it smelled amazing. What did I do with my little share fennel? I cut the fronds off and hung them to dry planning to use them later when canning up pizza and spaghetti sauce. Because that mysterious delicate aroma wafting up from the best red sauce you've ever eaten was probably fennel, it just makes all those familiar flavors newer and more intense. With the bulb I whipped up a quick green gazpacho. A chopped cucumber or two, a clove of garlic, the chopped fennel, salt, pepper, icy cold butter milk or yogurt and an avocado buzzed in the blender until smooth.  Delicious. Also an elegant component of a light summer meal and a great way to show off some local ingredients. I have served this in a frozen wide mouth pint jar topped with sliced cherry tomatoes. I freeze the spoons too and just forget about the ice. It is seriously flavorful and refreshing. And.... if you're felling extra inspired, infuse a batch of simple syrup with a small handful of fresh fennel fronds. Let it steep for about thirty minutes in the sugar syrup and then strain it into a pitcher of lemon juice and ice water. Stir and you've made fennel scented lemonade. Can't get more summery than that.