Salad Smackdown: Nectarine and Cherry Salad

Ginger Rapport's newsletters for the Beaverton Farmers Market are worth getting for the information and recipes she shares (click here to subscribe). Her deep knowledge of produce shines through, helped by her passion for cooking and education. Here she talks about the luscious Northwest peaches and nectarines tumbling into midsummer markets.

What is the difference between a peach and a nectarine? They are genetically almost the same with the exception of one gene, the one that determines if it will have a fuzzy or smooth skin. A nectarine is basically a bald peach. They may be used interchangeably in recipes but as far as fresh eating goes, people can have strong opinions about which is best. Many people prefer nectarines because they don’t like the fuzz on a peach. It is more of a textural thing than it is about taste. However, nectarines tend to be firmer, sweeter and more aromatic than their fuzzy cousins.

To peel or not to peel?

Both peaches and nectarines come in “freestone” varieties, which means that the fruit separates easily from the pit and “clingstone” varieties where the flesh clings tightly to the pit. Freestones are better for freezing while clingstones are better for canning.

If you are making a recipe that calls for removing the skin of a peach or nectarine, we recommend the following method:

With a paring knife, make a small "X" in the skin on the bottom of the fruit. Then drop it into a large pot of boiling water for 10-20 seconds. You may do multiple fruits at a time as long as you are able to get them all out of the boiling water within a few seconds of one another. You want to loosen the skin, not cook the fruit.

Roasted nectarines, anyone?

Immediately place fruit in a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking. Starting at the X on the bottom, lift the skin away from the fruit. It should peel easily if your fruit is ripe. If your fruit is under-ripe, peeling will be more difficult and may require a paring knife. (This is also how you peel tomatoes.)

Peach and nectarine season has a very small window where it overlaps with cherry season. One of our favorite—and totally easy—recipes that features both is this nectarine and cherry salad with roasted hazelnuts featuring Baird Family Orchards nectarines, Kiyokawa Family Orchards Bing cherries, and Ken and June's dry roasted hazelnuts.

Nectarine and Cherry Salad with Roasted Hazelnuts

1 1/2 lbs. nectarines (yellow or white) sliced
1 1/2 c. Bing cherries, pitted and halved
1/2 c. roasted hazelnuts, roughly chopped

Combine all ingredients (reserving some chopped nuts) in a bowl and toss. Garnish with remaining hazelnuts.

Click here to get more fabulous peach (or nectarine) recipes for desserts, jams, salads and even cocktails! The Beaverton Farmers Market is an advertiser and supporter of Good Stuff NW.

Inside Scoop

I've always fantasized about being on the inside, one of the few to know about a particular place where no sign marks its existence, a knock on the door gains entrance and a glance over your shoulder is required to ensure no one sees you disappear inside.

Would you know a great Japanese restaurant lurks here?

Last night I finally got my chance to go such a place when friends Jeff and Kathryn took us to Yuzu, a Japanese izakaya, or pub, in, of all places, deep Beaverton. Ironically located across the street from a Fred Meyer and sandwiched in an anonymous strip mall between a brightly lit Asian video store and a Korean restaurant, the small neon OPEN sign above the door is the only indication of a business there.

The cooks at Yuzu…they never stop moving!

But once inside, you might as well have stepped through a wormhole and ended up in one of Tokyo's bustling restaurant districts. People speaking Japanese and flames leaping up from the grills in the tiny open kitchen, with the cooks rushing from bubbling pots of hot oil, back to the grill and then out to the tables, give this place, which seats maybe 25 in a pinch, the air of a street stall rather than a sit-down restaurant.

Mmmm…pork belly.

And the food…oh my god…the food is astonishing, especially paired with the wide selection of wine, sake, shochu and beer. (Sapporo on tap? Never seen that before!) The whole menu is small plates, meant for sharing while patrons slurp the libation of their choice for hours on end. Temperature and texture are all-important, and the dishes run from chilled to room temp to hot, depending on what is ordered, a requirement that Yuzu takes very seriously.

Chilled tofu with shredded fish and green onions.

We were seated and immediately got our drinks and a little plate of warm, salty edamame. And almost as quickly our food started appearing, beginning with a tiny bowl of strips of fermented squid that reminded me of the taste of salty sea urchin. It was followed by chunks of pork belly that were so rich they literally melted in our mouths, causing much oohing and ahhing and moaning, along with wishes that several more plates of it be brought to the table.

Kabocha squash in broth.

Before we could make that request to our waitress, though, the cooks started bringing more little treasures out from the kitchen, including silken tofu topped with shredded dried fish and green onion in a bowl of ice, dried squid rings sautéed and served with braised tofu and daikon, and a shredded pork salad with a to-die-for miso dressing.

Sliced duck breast.

But since too much is never enough when the food is this crazy, we charged ahead and ordered, in no particular order, baked kabocha squash, marinated braised pig stomach (the menu said intestine, but at this point we weren't picky), delicate strips of meat mixed with a stew of soft tofu and vegetables, followed by thin planks of grilled beef tongue and a small grilled fish that was so fresh it was if it had come out of the sea moments before.

Deep fried lotus root with shrimp paste.

We'd almost had enough when our waitress recommended trying the duck, as well as shrimp paste sandwiched between slices of deep-fried lotus root. Not wanting to be impolite, we just nodded dazedly. The duck, succulent slices of roast breast with a layer of fat, had a wild, lightly gamy flavor and was cooked to a rosy perfection, and the lotus root finished off the evening (and our appetites) with its crunchy, herby tenderness.

If you're not planning a trip there very soon, I haven't done a good job describing the place. But then again, if you don't go, to put it in my family's parlance, that leaves more for me…

Details: Yuzu, 4130 SW 117th Ave., Beaverton. Phone 503-350-1801.

Beaverton's China Town

No sooner do I write a post about a good restaurant I found in (gasp!) the burbs than I find myself in deepest Beaverton to get Walker's hips x-rayed (it's some kind of show dog thing). The appointment isn't till two o'clock and, since it's around noon, his breeder and I meet at a little dim sum place I read about in last year's Diner section of the Oregonian.

Stuffed tofu

On busy Murray Boulevard across from the Nike campus, China Town Restaurant is nearly invisible to drivers whizzing by. But if you know it's there, you'll step inside its anonymous storefront and into some of the best dim sum I've had in the area. It's not the buzzing whirl of ladies pushing carts that you'll find at Fong Chong downtown, but the quality and freshness are definitely better here.

Eggplant with pork.

The pork shumai (top photo, lower right) are hot and juicy, and you can really taste the shrimp, ginger and sesame oil mixed with the pork that are the signature of this dish. The tofu stuffed with vegetables are luscious and have a lovely, lightly sweet sauce, and the shrimp har gow are similarly bursting with juicy flavor. I love the eggplant I've had at other places, and China Town's are terrific with a slice of pork giving the eggplant a hefty bite.

As with Peter and his Original Thai BBQ, I wish this place was closer. But I'll definitely be making the trek to China Town again when I get a hankering for some great dim sum.

Details: China Town Restaurant, 14125 SW Walker Rd., Beaverton. Phone 503-641-4153.