It’s still hot out there, Minnesota. Try this cooling soup. It's a perfect use for all those great local cukes flooding into the market.

Cacik, Turkish Cucumber, and Dill Soup

3 c. plain yogurt
3 large Euro-hydro cukes, split and seeded, or conventional farmstand cukes that have also been peeled. (You are looking for about 6 cups of diced, seedless cucumber.) The Euro cukes can be puréed with the skin on.
1/4 c. olive oil
1 small red onion, chopped
1 small fresh green chili (I like to use a Serrano)
1 garlic clove
4 sprigs fresh dill, or more to taste
2 sprigs fresh mint, no stems
1/2 c. cold vegetable stock or chicken stock
1 lime

The night before, strain yogurt through a cheese cloth–lined strainer set over a bowl in the refrigerator, letting it drip off all the water. Pulse cucumbers, oil, onion, chili, garlic, and herbs in a food processor or large blender. Do not over-mix. When pureed, stir into a work bowl and whisk in the yogurt. Season with salt and pepper and whisk in the stock, drizzling to achieve the desired consistency. Refrigerate and serve within 12 hours, seasoning again with salt, pepper and fresh lime juice. Serves 6.

Culinary tourism is one of the hottest travel trends these days, and people are always asking me who to book with and why. Short of tagging along with me one day while I’m eating bats in Thailand, you can check out Gourmet on Tour. Judith, the GOT honcho, is a delight and her tours are superbly run. And doesn’t this trip to the Amalfi Coast sounds awesome? The Amalfi Coast is the sexy pin-up girl of the chic travel monthlies for a reason—the breathtaking views of the Mediterranean and a perfect locale for quintessential dolce vita. Gourmet on Tour teams up the Amalfi with the Agata!

Here are some of the highlights she sent me.

Mamma Agata, the GOT chef, will share with you her insider's secrets and local knowledge—far beyond the traditional tourist holiday.

Pick vegetables from the kitchen garden, cook up a storm, and listen to Mamma’s stories about cooking for celebrities. You can hike high on the mountainside while soaking up the stunning views from Ravello to Amalfi, or savor a delicious Michelin-star dinner on a cliff-top terrace after a day spent touring ancient Paestum and Pompeii, or explore Positano and the stylish isle of Capri. I like the idea of sipping Prosecco poolside or on the beach.

Apparently Mamma Agata started cooking at the young age of thirteen in the kitchens of a wealthy American lady who owned a summer villa in Ravello. Since then she has cooked for Hollywood stars like Humphrey Bogart, Anita Eckberg, Richard Burton, Liz Taylor, Fred Astaire, Federico Fellini (a big pasta e fagioli fan), Jacqueline Kennedy, Marcello Mastroianni, and for writers and politicians such as Susanna Agnelli and Gore Vidal. These days she holds her cooking classes in her 300-year-old country house located on a cliff top 1,000 feet above the sea, with magnificent views. She makes or raises everything used in the classes: chickens, eggs, vegetables, fruits, marmalades, olive oil, wine—the best of everything. Elegant simplicity is the way in which Mamma Agata prepares and shares a meal at table. Here is a recipe from Mamma that Judith sent me to whet your whistle:

Mamma Agata's famous lemon cake
Dolce al limone di Mamma Agata

250 gr butter
300 gr sugar
2 grated lemons
4 eggs
300 gr flour
1 glass of warm milk
1 small envelope of yeast (Pan degli Angeli)

Place butter and sugar in a mixer for 8 minutes. Add lemon grate, eggs and flour, and at the end add milk and yeast. Fill the dough in a baking form and place in a preheated oven for 45 minutes. Remove from oven. Squeeze the juice of 1 lemon, mix with some water and sugar, and cover the cake. Turn cake over and pour juice of the second lemon mixed with sugar and some water on the other side of the cake. Decorate with finely chopped nuts.

Today is a travel day for the Zimmerns, back to Minnesota after the big family vacation. One of our last nights was spent out with friends in the Twin Towns of Kennebunk and Kennebunkport . . . no, it wasn’t the Bush 41’s. We dined at an incredible new restaurant, the two-season-old Big Fish, and I’ll save that for later in the week, so I can post all the pix.

Rishia discovered a great bakery that we had heard about, but never visited on previous trips, called Standard Baking Company, housed on the ground level of the building that Fore Street, one of New England’s best restaurants, occupies. The breads are some of the best artisanal products of any bakery in the lower forty-eight, the raspberry and apricot galettes are to die for, buttery and crumbly, like shortbread-filled cookies more than tarts, and the croissants are perfectly chewy with a crust that reeks of caramel as you swallow it in the unique way that only the best puff doughs do. Put it on your list, and more on Big Fish and our evening in Kennebunk later in the week.

P.S. Anyone know what Kiefer Sutherland is doing in Portland, Maine? No one around here can say for sure, but Noah and I spotted him Sunday evening dining with a friend on Monument Street at a funky little outdoor café.

Women on the Verge of A Nervous Breakdown is still my fave Almodovar movie, and as in the film, we always try to keep a pitcher of gazpacho in our fridge (minus the valium) in the warm weather months as a snack and as an easy thing to build a meal around. Keep large batches of this easy and addictive soup on hand throughout the rest of the summer, and if you haven’t seen the film you should rent it, if only for the gazpacho pitcher that steals the film.

Gazpacho
6 c. tomato juice
2 t. dried oregano
6 fresh basil leaves, torn several times
1/4 c. Spanish extra virgin olive oil (my favorites are Nunez de Prado and L’estornel)
2 fresh garlic cloves, chopped
2 t. Crystal brand hot sauce
1 T. fresh lemon juice
3 T. red wine vinegar
2 T. Worcestershire sauce
4 ripe tomatoes, peeled and seeded
2 c. chopped, peeled, and seeded cucumbers
2 c. green peppers, chopped
1 red onion, chopped

Place tomato juice in a large work bowl and add oregano, basil, and olive oil. Season with some sea salt and freshly ground white pepper. Set aside and place remaining ingredients in work bowl of a food processor and pulse to combine in batches, adding tomato juice mixture in equal proportions as you purée. Do not over-mix. You are looking for an evenly textured purée with some grit to it. The crunch and the pretty visuals will come later from your diced vegetable garnishes. Chill, taste, and adjust the salt and acid (lemon-vinegar) flavors and serve, garnishing as indicated below. Serves 6.

Garnish
Try any or all of these great “soup accessories” with your next batch of Gazpacho.

• Bread cubes, brushed with bruised garlic and pan-fried crisp in olive oil
• Minced pepper, cucumber, tomato, and onion mixed in equal parts
• Minced parsley
• Olive oil drizzles

Portland, Maine, has a thing for wood.

Fore Street, one of the most awarded and written about restaurants over the last few years, is a charming, simple, and chic restaurant that cooks entirely on wood. They have a wood-burning oven for roasting mackerel with mustard butter, or for their famous skillet-roasted mussels with almonds. They rotisserie local pork racks and whole farm-fresh chicken over wood and their sauté pans sit on a wood-burning stovetop. We always eat there at least once a year, and we’ll be there Thursday evening. Every single scrap of food in the place is locally sourced except the olive oil and if you don’t save room for the native cheese plate you are nuts.

Yesterday we ate at a place that my dad has been raving about for years—Flatbread Company, a pizza restaurant with a massive wood-burning oven built by hand out of river stones. Its pizza sauces are cooked in a forty-gallon cauldron that sits on an open wood fire and I have to tell you that the sight of this thing bubbling away and the aroma it creates are stupendous. The pizza is heavenly, and even the pepperoni is handmade and aged on the premises. The joint sits on the end of a dock in downtown Portland and may have the best views of any pizza joint east of Naples.

Today we went up to Five Islands for a lobster roll and some fried clams, my favorite spot in and around the city of Portland. The Five Islands Lobster Company has three huts on the end of a pier that falls into the Atlantic, all surrounded by picnic tables. One hut sells steamed lobsters and clams, one sells ice cream, and the other makes lobster rolls and fried clam baskets. We ordered our rolls, watched Noah play on the dock, showed him a lobsterman unloading his catch and floating his traps along a net line waiting to be cooked. I took some pix with my phone to give you an idea of this place but words alone can’t do it justice. Having a fresh lobster roll almost every day, each one in a spot more idyllic than the previous one can be dangerous, but what the heck, we’re on vacation. Everyone in our car agreed that the sweetest, best-tasting lobster rolls are from Five Islands, and the fried clams are greaseless beauties, served with the rarest of condiments, homemade tartar sauce. So the moral of the story is if you don’t eat food cooked over wood, at least eat your food standing on it . . . it’s a reach, I know, but all this vacation-Dad stuff has me exhausted.

There is nothing more quintessentially American than piling the whole gang into the proverbial family wagon (in this case an NWA flight back east) and taking a family vacation. This year The Rishia, Noah, and I are visiting my dad in Maine. We have rented a place for a week and are using it as our base camp. We have a busy week planned. Boating, beaching, strolling Portland Harbor, and enjoying a short time away from the daily grind. Today we tore up the shops in Freeport, fueling ourselves on lobster rolls, steamers, and ginger ale.

There are three lobster rolls we are addicted to. Dad loves Red’s in Wiscasset, a full lobster yanked out of the shell, dipped in butter, and served on a toasted roll. You have to get on line when they open at 11 a.m. otherwise you will wait all day. It’s worth it.

Five Island’s Lobster Company is a lobster wholesaler and retailer whose dock sits at the end of a dirt road on a pier jutting out into the Atlantic about forty minutes north of Portland. They have a shack where you can order fried clams and lobster rolls and I think it is the perfect roll in the perfect spot. Theirs is bound with mayo, not butter, just enough to coat, nothing really perceptible. Just a smidge. You eat on the porch overlooking the harbor, and watch their boats pull up with full traps all day long. I love this place.

Rishia’s top spot is Day’s in Yarmouth (207-846-5871), where we ate today, and I have to admit, she may be on to something. We eat at Day’s more often than the others, mostly because it is the closest to my dad’s house, but the quality is amazing every time we go, fresh and saline lobster bursting with oceanic flavor, bound with a hint of mayo on a toasted roll, steamers that are sweeter than sugar, and big cups of iced ginger ale. Their stand is off Route 1 North, at exit 17 off 295, about twenty minutes outside of the city, on a teeny little bend in a river that runs out to the ocean. We always sit at the same table, under the same tree each year, and this summer we got to take Noah. The family pix are attached.

Sitting in the shade of the big maples, watching the gulls whirl, eating lobster rolls and steamers with the family . . . a perfect summer day.

Looking for ways to beat the heat? Try this awesome cold poached salmon dish, and remember that you can use leftover grilled striped bass or shrimp, or a cooked and cooled lobster pulled from the shell, or any cooked and chilled oceanic edible you can think of.

Cold Poached Salmon with Green Goddess Dressing

Cucumber Salad
1/2 c. sugar (or more to taste)
1 c. cider vinegar
2 European hydro-cukes, sliced thin
4 T. chopped dill
1/4 c. thinly sliced shallots

Combine sugar and vinegar. Pour over remaining ingredients, stir, and refrigerate at least 4 hours before serving.

The Dressing
8 chopped scallions
12 anchovies
2 T. capers
3 T. fresh tarragon
2 T. fresh dill
1 bunch Italian parsley
2 T. red wine vinegar
2 T. lemon juice
1 garlic clove
2 T. Worcestershire sauce
1 c. sour cream
1 c. mayonnaise
3 T. olive oil

Combine all ingredients in a blender. Blend, season, and serve or refrigerate.

The Salmon
2 c. white wine
1/2 c. Chopped onion
1/2 c. Chopped carrot
1/2 c. Chopped celery
2-1/2 lbs. wild Yukon River king salmon

Combine wine, onion, carrot, and celery, along with a few peppercorns, in a large 14-inch pan with 6 cups of water, and bring to a boil. Add fish pieces, trimmed in square portions if you like (count on a 6-ounce portion of wild salmon for an entrée), to the poaching liquid. Cook for roughly 10 minutes until fish firms up, plate the fish, discard the liquid, and refrigerate fish for 6 hours. Serve with the salad, dolloping the dressing on top of the fish at the table. Serves 6-8.

Last minute changes . . . oy vey!

For months we had been planning on a day or so shooting in the soft sand dunes of Erfud, with a tribe of bedouins who would be doing a camel cookout with us. We would spend the day and night in this incredibly unique and stunning locale with nomadic tribespeople who live the same way their ancestors have for thousands of years. No such luck.

While we were in Madrid a major sandstorm wiped out the oasis and put four feet of sand all through the neighboring village, so now there is no Erfud for us to see. But we have a theme for our next few days—we need to find some camel to chow down on!

Now, camels are the most efficient animals for domesticating in the desert, so getting some folks to part with one for a cookout is tricky, but Mo says he can make it happen and at this point we trust him, despite our best instincts. Shannon re-works our shooting dates at the eleventh hour and we set off across the Atlas mountains to Ourzazate, a hard rock desert town that Mo swears is not only a great place to shoot some tagine and a traditonal Berber meal in a local inn, but also persuades us that the local casbah (fort) is going to be a great location for some beauty shots.

We leave behind the olive groves and hustle and bustle of Marrakesh and head out for our eight-hour schlep across Morocco. As we leave the city, we pass the Palerais, the Beverly Hills of Marrakech. Everyone from Sean Connery to Adnan Kashoggi have residences here, the homes are INCREDIBLE, and the idea of sitting poolside for a few weeks, being fed fresh oranges and pigeon pie, is a powerfully attractive intoxicant—but duty calls. Mo is celeb-crazed and won't shut up about late '70s French film stars he knows. Apparently he once drove Alain Delon around, and escorted David Hasselhoff through Marrakesh, and keeps pictures of them in his briefcase. Trippy!

Now we have our fate in the hands of the two Mos . . . . a frightening thought. Do you know what a mahari is? It's an old male camel that has loads of desert experience, and bedouins will tell you that you always keep a mahari tied up inside your tent so that if a sandstorm comes and wipes out everything and all your camels run off in the night and everyone dies, you can lash yourself to your mahari and it will save your life since invariably he will head directly to water/food and a female camel, not necessarily in that order. Mo is our mahari, and the idea that I have lashed myself to him is petrifying. I don't trust him and my internal radar is sounding an alert. Vigilance!

The ride to Ourzazate is awesome. Oases at 3,000 feet that have some of the most incredible orchards on the planet since the mountains refelct the sun into these hundred-mile-long notches where snow runoff guarantees plenty of water. The citrus, apricots, melons, tomatoes, and other vegetables are some of the best I have ever tasted and every few miles there is a stand with a few farmers selling their goods. We bump into a weekly market in a little mountain town called Zerten and we stop to check out the fruit vendors, the raw goats swinging from the open air stalls, and the tagines, and Mo assures us that his buddies in Ourzazate have some camel for us to check out when we get there. All the goats in the market are skinned except for the heads and feet so prospective customers can see what type of animal it is, that way you know you're not buying someone's doggie when you want some lamb, goat, etc. All the testicles are left attached to the carcass because the Moroccans believe the boys taste better than the girls and the vendors want to assure the shoppers that they are buying little fellas not little ladies. Apparently the last customer of the day gets his portions lopped off the haunches and they throw in the balls. Very fair system, I think.

So back into the van and off we go, stopping in medieval little mountain towns along the way, farmers working their donkeys do the roads, women and children wash laundry in the rivers made swift with the snowmelt, and the jacaranda trees are in full bloom for a hundred miles. Waterfalls cascade from the peaks and Berber villages are camouflaged into the sides of the mountains, a stunning scene if ever there was one.

We pull into Ourzazate, sliding past the largest film sound stage outside of Hollywood. It's surreal. Every Sand and Sandals epic ever shot has been filmed here, from Liz Taylor's Cleopatra to Raiders of the Lost Ark to Gladiator—it's quite surreal. We pull into the town proper, check into our hotel, and learn two things:

1.) The off-road Trans-Morocco road race is in Ourzazate for the night and the town is packed with race teams. Imagine the Indy 500 going from town to town and you get the idea. Other than the Paris-Dakar rally, this is the second biggest race of the year, and it shows. The stuff is being broadcast live all over the globe (except in the USA) and seeing all the rally cars and their teams up close is really cool.

2.) Mo's buddies have no camel, but we are going to make lemonade with our lemons and shoot there anyway. The search for camel meat continues, and Mo insists that he can find someone who will be harvesting one from a herd and we may have to pay big bucks, but we can eat one for sure. His bravado and self-confidence is scaring me, but all the preproduction research shows that camel is available, so who knows . . . I would feel better if I had a more convincing mahari to rely on. Being around Mo I feel less and less like a savvy bedouin and more and more like the goat at Zerten, waiting for his balls to be cut off.

Flying in over Marrakech for the first time you can't help but be impressed with the riveting contrasts of the North African landscape—rugged mountains, stunning coast line, hard rocky deserts, verdant oases, sandy dunes—and a satellite dish on every rooftop. So we land in Morocco around lunchtime, meet Mo #1, who for the next week will be our guide, fixer, translator, problem solver, problem creator, con man, and raconteur. He is a piece of work. Six and a half feet tall, and every inch the walking, talking cliche of the savvy souk (market) negotiant. Need a rug? Mo has a cousin. Need a camel for a shot? Mo knows a guy. Of course once you drive half-way across the country to get your camel or your rug, the deal has changed, the rules have been renegotiated, and Mo is now in charge.

Mo

Here is a typical chat with Mo:
Me: What time are we meeting in the lobby tomorrow to start our day?
Shannon (my producer): I'm thinking 8 a.m.
Mo: 9 a.m
Shannon: Mo, we need to start at 8.
Mo: No, 9 is fine.
Shannon: But we have to be at our location at 9. We meet at 8, Mo.
Me: Mo, don't look at me, Shannon is in charge.

Mo, ignoring everyone, stomps off to the van. He does not like taking direction from an American woman.

Now this may all seem trivial, but since we are paying Mo, and he is translating for us, and arranging all our trip details, his reworking of our agenda, which he tries at least six times a day, is a royal pain in the ass. Everywhere we go, we grease his people, we stop for his coffee, we listen to him complain, and we quickly realize that we need to give him credit for the idea, out loud, in public conversation.

Shannon: Mo, I like your idea of getting an 8 a.m. start tomorrow, so we get to the shoot at 9.
Mo: That's what I have been saying!

You get the idea, and you will learn all about Mo as the week grows old. Mo #2 is Mo #1's assistant and driver-sidekick, and Mo #2 thinks Mo#1 is crazy. This should be a fun shoot.

So we check into our hotel and head right out to shoot in the Djemma al Fna, which is the oldest market in North Africa, the cultural ground zero of Moroccan street life, the location of the Koutoubia, a giant mosque tower and also home to every vagrant, peddler, and one-eyed con man in the city. Behind the Djemma is the old souk, a labrynthine spider's web of alleys and dead-ends that is home to tens of thousands of little shops, kiosks, and lunch counters. Anything you can ever imagine finding for sale is sold in the souk. Spices, olives, lamps, mint, kebabs, candy, caravan serai—you name it, and it's also highly dangerous the further and deeper you penetrate the network of streets that are purposely unnamed and uniquely serpentined to allow for people who know the layout to dissappear if need be, say with a purloined purse.

Tagine

We shoot some b-roll and hit the main square at dinner hour, when all the carts roll in from all over the city, turning the Djemma into the greatest collection of portable snack carts I have seen since spending a few days on New Lane in Penang. From sheeps heads to liver kebabs, fresh-squeezed citrus juice to whole fried flounder, tagines of every type and mint tea at every turn. I am starting to warm up to this place.

Djemma

OK, kids, save the burgers and dogs for next weekend and fire up the ambition meter to eleven for the big July 4 to-do. You can make the cobbler and granita ahead of time, you can do the salad in the morning, but you need to do the crispy shallots at the last minute. Then toss the quail on the grill—they only take a few minutes on hot coals and you will be the BBQ legend you always dreamed of becoming.

Summer Tomato and Onion Salad with Buttermilk Blue Cheese dressing

6 ripe heirloom tomatoes, sliced thin
1 red onion, sliced thin
12 shallots, sliced paper-thin
1 c. milk
1 c. flour seasoned with paprika, salt, pepper, etc.
2 T. minced chives

Arrange tomatoes and onion on a platter. Pop out the rings of the shallots and soak in milk for 20 minutes. Drain and toss shallots with the flour, kicking off excess by dumping the rings in a mesh strainer. Fry in 350-degree oil until crisp and drain on paper towels. Arrange shallots on top of tomatoes, garnish with chives, and serve with the dressing (see below). Serves 6.

BBC Dressing
10 oz. Maytag blue cheese
1/4 c. red wine vinegar
1 t. ground black pepper
1 T. Worcestershire sauce
1/4 c. cream
1/4 c. sour cream
1 T. minced dill
2 scallions, whites only
1/4 c. olive oil
1/4 c. buttermilk

Combine all ingredients in blender, pulsing to prevent over-mixing. Drizzle in some olive oil and buttermilk to taste if you like a looser dressing. Garnish salad with dressing or pass at the table.

Grilled Quail with Hot Peppers, Apricot, and Mustard Glaze
12 boneless quail
1/2 c. brown mustard
3/4 c. apricot jam, jelly, or conserve
3 T. cider vinegar
1 T. ground coriander seed
1 t. sea salt
1 t. freshly ground white pepper
2 Serrano chilies, minced fine, seeds and all

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and let marinate overnight. Grill on medium direct heat for 5 minutes per side, turning frequently, and serve at a pinkish medium. Combine a few tablespoons of apricot conserve and vinegar as a mop for the quail. This dish is great with cole slaw and corn bread. Serves 4-5.

Strawberry Granita with Balsamic Vinegar

3 pints quartered, cleaned strawberries
1-1/2 c. sugar
3 c. of the best rose champagne you can get your hands on (Don’t use pink champagne. Drink what remains while granita sets up.)
1 T. lemon juice (or more to taste)

Combine half the berries, the sugar, and 1/3 c. water in a medium saucepan. Bring to a simmer to dissolve sugar. Transfer mixture to a food processor, add reserved berries, and process until smooth. Strain through a fine mesh sieve and stir in champagne and lemon juice. Scrape mixture into a shallow metal baking pan (14 inches is fine) and freeze. Every 20 minutes, stir and scrape the granita. After 3-4 hours the granita will be ready to serve (shale-y and roughly frozen).

You can also freeze completely and pulse the frozen granita in a food processor. Or, you can scrape the granita with a spoon instead of processing it. Serve granita with fresh berries and pass a bottle of aged, syrupy balsamic vinegar.

Peach Cobbler
10 ripe, free-stone Colorado peaches, peeled, stoned, and quartered
5 t. cornstarch
2 t. fresh grated ginger
1/2 c. sugar

Toss, place in a buttered baking dish, cover with cobbler topping, and bake for 45-50 minutes at 350 until hot and bubbly with a browned top. Serve warm. Serves 6-8.

Cobbler topping
2 c. flour
1 t. baking powder
Pinch of salt
3-1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
2 c. sugar
2 eggs
1 t. vanilla extract
1 c. sliced toasted almonds
1/4 c. sweet almond paste

Mix dry ingredients and reserve. Beat butter, almond paste, and sugar until well-blended. Beat in egg and vanilla. Stir flour mixture into butter mixture and, while stirring, add nuts until just combined. Crumble/dollop over the cobbler.