Every so often, I stroll into the grocery store, filled with hope and delusion. Today’s the day, I tell myself. Today, I’m finally going to get my life together. I skip the cookie aisle (with only minor regret) and head straight for the produce section, loading up my cart like I’m prepping for a health magazine cover shoot. Lettuce? Absolutely. Broccoli? Sure, why not. Brussel Sprouts? Yum, I will roast them. Oh, and cucumbers—my one true veggie love. Not just one, though. I buy a pack of three, like the overachiever I pretend to be.
I bring it all home, arranging it neatly in the fridge with full intentions of becoming the veggie queen of meal prep. This week will be different, I swear. Salads for days, snacks of crisp cucumber slices, and I might even toss in a green smoothie for good measure.
But, of course, life happens. Day one, I make a big delicious salad, and I’m so proud, I’m sure I will do it every day. Day two, I have a stomach ache, so no salad for me. Day three- too tired to cook the Brussel Sprouts. Day four, I slice up one cucumber and bask in my tiny triumph—because let’s face it, cucumbers are basically the only vegetable I actually want to eat. But after that? Well, the remaining two cucumbers sit there, slowly turning into slimy science experiments. I love them, but eating them every day? Yeah, not so much.
By day 10, I open the fridge to find a salad graveyard. The lettuce is limp, the spinach has gone full liquid, the broccoli and brussels are brown and my cucumbers are now slimy and tragic. One more dream of healthy living slips away into the trash.
I keep telling myself I’ll learn. Maybe I should just buy one cucumber at a time. Maybe I should meal prep the way I imagine I will every single time I go shopping. Or maybe I’ll just stick to what I know best: good intentions, slightly better-than-last-week habits, and a killer cucumber recipe I’ll throw in at the end of this to salvage my dignity.
Because let’s be honest, the only thing getting consistently used in my fridge is the ice cream.
My son’s girlfriend gave me her recipe for cucumbers, I lost it, so I make my own now. I don’t think hers had the sesame oil, but I think that’s my favorite part.
I slice my cucumbers with my favorite rotary slicer/grater (after almost slicing my thumb off on a mandolin slicer).
I add garlic salt, chili crunch (I like Trader Joe’s the best), toasted sesame oil, soy sauce, and rice vinegar. Then I sprinkle toasted sesame seeds and shake it all up in a Tupperware. Yum…now that I wrote this, I want it! But there is about a 75% chance my cucumber is a science experiment in my produce drawer. I’m taking bets!
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