One of my favorite veggies is the sugar snap pea. Last year we planted just a few sugar snap pea plants in a little plot on the side of the house. Alex and I decided we would try it out, seeing if we wanted to explore gardening for real. When the plants started to produce peas I would send the boys out with a bowl to collect some to go with dinner. The bowl never had any peas in it when they got back to the kitchen, but the boys had bellies full of snap peas. One day I looked out the window at the boys jumping on the trampoline, and saw one of the cutest things ever. They would jump for a while and then run to the garden and snack on peas, jump and snack, repeat. It was like a built in snack bar for them. As you know from my past posts and photos of the 6 new raised beds Alex built this year, we loved gardening and decided to go all out this year. Bring on the snap peas because clearly there can never be enough in the Buck house!
Busy day today, including a late lunch, so we needed a light dinner tonight. I made toast slices from a loaf of gluten free French bread and topped them with an herbed ricotta and a fresh snap pea salad. They were to die for!
Start by slicing a loaf of French bread, drizzle with a little olive oil and place them on a hot grill until they have some nice color.
Drop your cleaned sugar snap peas, about two cups, into a large pot of boiling water for 3 minutes. Have an ice bath ready to immediately plunge them into. This will stop the cooking process, keeping your snap peas a beautiful green color and still have a crunch.
Take 1 to 1 1/2 cups of ricotta cheese and mix in 1 tablespoon of olive oil, salt, pepper, and fresh chopped chives, available in the Springdell pick your own herb garden!
Next, drain the sugar snap peas and pat them dry. Cut the peas to be bite sized, it’s good to split about half of the peas open so you have peas mixed in with full pods as well. Toss them with 2 Tablespoons of olive oil, the zest from one lemon, a squeeze of fresh lemon juice and 5 leaves of mint cut into very thin slivers (also in the herb garden). Toss together and you have the simple pea salad.
Spread the toasts with the ricotta mixture and top with the pea salad. Served with a simple side of fresh strawberries. So clean and delicious, you will totally be making this one more than once! Alex asked today if there was any leftover for lunch. Not so much as a crumb. Enjoy!
