I’ve been making my own adapted version of the smashed cucumber salad recipe from Silvena Rowe’s, Purple Citrus and Sweet Perfume: Cuisine of the Eastern Mediterranean for the last few years, but I’ve never had the chance to pair a few of the key ingredients: cucumber and mulberry. Their seasons just haven’t overlapped well. However, this year I plucked some of the last mulberries of the season from a local tree just as cucumbers started to form in my garden and I was finally able to taste them together!

I highly recommend this cookbook. I am often inspired by the way that herbs, flowers, and spices are used in parts of the Eastern Mediterranean, and this book appeals to me both on that level, as well as its generous and creative use of atypical ingredients from the kitchen garden such as nasturtium flowers, lemon balm, Swiss chard, and purslane to name a few.

I have never made this recipe by following quantities or directions in the book — I just wing it every time based on what looks right proportionately. For that reason I’ve written this as I make it rather than in usual recipe format. Ingredients are in bold so that you can easily pick them out.

RECIPE: Smashed Cucumber Salad

This is a gorgeous and refreshing salad for a hot summer day. Make it directly before eating or set it in the fridge to chill.

Set 3 or 4 small-sized cucumbers (I use whatever variety is on hand, but based on the book tend to favour a smooth-skinned Lebanese variety) on a cutting board and lightly smash using a rolling pin or the back of a pan until they are broken open. In the book Silvena suggests peeling the cucumbers, but I always leave the peel on. Using your hands, roughly tear larger pieces up into bite-sized chunks.

Roughly chop a bit of fresh dill and mint leaves. Add a few flowers of either if they are available.

Combine the cucumber, dill, and mint in a bowl and mix in a few dollops of plain yoghurt. Season to taste with a pinch of sea salt. Serve with a handful of mulberries, a pinch of powdered sumac* and a drizzle of pomegranate molasses**. The recipe in the book also includes toasted pistachio nuts, but alas an allergist recommended that I stop eating them.

* Sumac is a common Middle Eastern spice that comes from the dried berry of an edible sumac tree (Rhus coriaria). The ground berry offers a tart, citrus tang to dishes.

** Pomegranate molasses is a sweet and tangy syrup made from pomegranate juice. You can buy small bottles of it in good spice shops. In Toronto I have purchased it at the Spice Shop in Kensington Market and at the St. Lawrence Market. You can also try making your own by reducing pomegranate juice, sugar, and lemon juice over medium heat.