Garlic scapes

I miss the farmers market in Noho a lot. For one thing, although you can get okay tomatoes all year round here, there are NO heirloom tomatoes. None!

I miss the little seasonal markers too, like the few weeks when they sell garlic scapes. But now, it looks like I may have garlic scapes any time I want, so maybe Perth isn't so bad after all. I didn't recognise them at first because they are straight and have had their heads cut off, and they're labelled 'garlic shoots', but they are scapes. Now, they are not seasonal, local scapes -- I didn't look too hard at the label, but they may have come from China -- but they are delicious nonetheless. (I hadn't realized it, but garlic shoots are not just an American farmers market thing, it seems they are actually a common Chinese ingredient.)

My favourite thing to do with them is saute them on a very hot pan with green beans. I like them to get browned and blistered. We had them with a Meyer lemon risotto, and chickenish seitan. (I liked this meal so much that I broke my own unspoken rule and made exactly the same thing the very next week.)