June: The Month of Red Fruit

Red was my favorite candy flavor growing up.

Not cherry exactly. Not strawberry exactly. Just red.

Red was the flavor of the best lollipop, the better popsicle, the candy you picked first if someone handed you a mixed bag. Red tasted like summer before summer had officially clocked in. Or “clocked it,” as the kids might say. I am hip. Period.

June feels like that to me.

This is the month when the fruit finally starts showing off. Strawberries, cherries, raspberries, rhubarb. The kind of ingredients that make you stop at the market table a

little longer than you planned.

And cherries are the real trouble.

At the cherry stand, I become a different person. Take my wallet. Just take it.

Red was my favorite candy flavor growing up, but let me be clear: watermelon candy is where I start asking questions. If you like watermelon candy, I may question your judgment. It does not mean we can’t be friends, but I have my eye on you.

I have, for the record, scoured the seed catalogs for blue raspberry plants with no luck, but I’ll keep looking.

Planting the garden is always exciting to me, partly because it is beautiful and partly because it is ridiculous. Every spring it becomes a very small, very personal drama.

Will it grow?

Why is it being so shy?

Who invited aphids?

Did I plant that there on purpose?

Where did the sugar snap peas go?

Very good questions.

I start putting seeds into the ground and into pots in the greenhouse, and by the end of the month I’m throwing seeds around like a maniac tossing rice at a wedding.

Except you can’t throw rice anymore. Now it is bubbles and other less-starchy, hopefully-won’t-kill-a-bird type items. Anyway.

Who knows what is out there in the dirt, waiting to pop up as a surprise in exactly the wrong area?

This year has already had its plot twists. I got three strawberries. Three. Which feels less like a harvest and more like a message. I’m not sure if the culprit was animal, insect, bird, squirrel, or canine named Olive, bless her heart, but someone got there first.

We have had bird nests in potted plants and bunnies tucked into the mint patch, which sounds charming until you remember that the garden is not actually yours. You are just one of the larger mammals with a watering can.

The squirrels, who honestly make both me and the dog crazy, are still digging around the dahlias, searching for things that may or may not be under there. The dahlias are trying to have a moment. The squirrels are conducting an investigation. Olive is deeply invested in the case.

This spring we also lost all of our elderberries to borer, and I have to say, I really do not like those little assholes. Maybe next year. That is the gardener’s most dangerous sentence.

But there is still so much going in and coming up: apples, pears, plums, zucchini, cucumbers, beans, figs, blueberries, tomatoes, garlic, currants, and a whole slew of other things that will have me processing fruit and vegetables in August and September while swearing I will never do this to myself again.

But for now, it is exciting.

Right now, it is all possibility. Tiny leaves, hopeful starts, damp soil, labels I may or may not remember to read later. ( I won't, I stopped writing them when it became an admin chore)

The garden is still being charming. Give it a minute.

By August, I will be standing in the kitchen surrounded by too much of something, asking why I did this to myself. But in June, I still believe everyone is going to behave.

And honestly, I love that part.

Red fruit, at this point in the season, does not need much from me.

Strawberries are good because they are strawberries. Cherries are good because you can stand at the counter and eat too many before you ever decide what they are for.

Rhubarb is tart, bossy, and usually right. (Rhubarb is giving Virgo energy)

This is the part of the season where I try not to overdo it. Add a little sugar. Add heat if it helps. Add cream, yogurt, pastry, or ice cream if that is where the day is headed.

And sometimes the whole plan is just eating cherries out of hand and pretending that was not half the bag.

I think about cherries a lot this time of year because I once learned, the very practical way, what happens when you try to turn a lot of them into juice.

A friend and I were donating fruit shrubs for Cooks for Black Lives Matter, and we had this beautiful little plan. Tiny bottles. Bespoke labels. Little tops. Very charming. Very considered. The original idea was cherry.

Then we pitted cases of cherries.

Cases.

And after all that, the yield was almost rude. About a cup of juice per pound, if the cherries were feeling generous.

That is when it became cherry-mango, because mango juice is a whole lot easier to tease out of its fruit.

The cherries were still the point. Mango just helped the math.

That is the sort of kitchen lesson I actually keep: sometimes the plan changes because the fruit is being difficult.

So this month, I’m leaning into red. Not in a precious way. In a June way.

Roasted cherries over yogurt or ice cream. Strawberries sliced with a little sugar until they make their own syrup. Rhubarb cooked down until it goes soft and sharp and jammy. Raspberries barely touched because they are fragile and expensive and frankly deserve respect.

This is the kind of cooking I love teaching because it builds confidence without turning the kitchen into a performance. You learn how heat changes fruit. You learn what salt does in a sweet dish. You learn how sugar pulls out juice. You learn that “done” is not always a timer. Sometimes it is the smell, the color, the way the fruit slumps in the pan.

And you learn that not everything needs to become a recipe.

Some things can just be a bowl of cherries on the counter, slowly disappearing.

Cherry pit spitting is a real summer game, and probably why we have three volunteer cherry trees in our yard.

So maybe the garden does know what it is doing.

Or maybe we are just bad at aiming.

That counts too.

Of course, some things do need to become a recipe, especially when the garden has already eaten your plans.

So, in solidarity with the lost peas, here is a salad that uses the ones you still have, the ones you buy because your garden betrayed you, or the ones you meant to grow before nature, wildlife, weather, and/or one very interested dog got involved.

Spelt Salad with Sugar Snap Peas and Feta

Yield: 4 servings

Spelt is the more nutritionally robust cousin of wheat, with a 7,000-year history. It was one of the first grains used for bread, and it brings a lovely chewiness to this spring-to-summer salad.

Ingredients

1 cup pearled spelt berries

12 ounces asparagus, trimmed, cut into 1 1/2-inch lengths, blanched and shocked

2 cups sliced sugar snap peas

1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved

1/2 cup sliced green onion

6 tablespoons chopped fresh dill

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1/4 cup red wine vinegar

1 small shallot, minced

1 7-ounce package feta cheese, crumbled

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method

Bring 3 cups of water to a boil in a 2-quart saucepan. Salt the water generously. Add the spelt, cover, and simmer for about 30 minutes, or until al dente. Drain if needed, then spread the grains on a baking sheet to cool.

In a large bowl, toss together the blanched asparagus, sugar snap peas, cherry tomatoes, green onions, and fresh dill.

In a small bowl, whisk together the olive oil, red wine vinegar, and minced shallot.

Add the vinaigrette to the vegetables, then fold in the cooled spelt and crumbled feta.

Taste and adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper.

Cook out!