Giant Vegetables

Yesterday, I went to the Wednesday Santa Monica farmer's market to pick up vegetables for the week.  I'm cooking dinner for one for the next week, so I decided to stock up on vegetables and go green while everyone else is away.  The market was packed despite the the dreary day.  For the most part, not much change in the seasonal fruits and vegetables over the last couple of weeks, although cherries are pretty much gone, there are more and more heirloom tomatoes, and I saw my first pepper.  I bought a ton of salad greens, a big bag of arugula and a big bag of Italian mix (wild arugula, mizuna and radicchio), some heirloom cherry tomatoes, leeks, green onions and an avocado.

Last night, I made some soup with some abnormally large vegetables, a zucchini / squash from the backyard and some farmer's market leeks for a zucchini leek soup.  Unlike the East Coast which has been sweltering under a heat wave, it's actually been quite chilly here; mostly overcast with even some light drizzle - perfect soup weather.  I basically used the same recipe I always use, using 1 giant zucchini, 2 large leeks, 1 tiny onion, 2 cloves of garlic, and chicken stock.

I also made a quick heirloom tomato caprese salad with a small heirloom tomato from last week, fresh mozzarella, basil from my shrinking basil plant (those leaves are as big as they get now, any ideas on what I can do to make them grow larger?), balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper.  It was good, though I think the heirloom tomato wasn't as sweet as it should have been.