Steamed Cucumber
Slightly adapted from Barbara Tropp’s The Modern Art Of Chinese Cooking
Preparation/cooking time: less than fifteen minutes total
Yield: as much as you wish; see notes
You will need a steamer to make this dish. See notes for rigging up makeshift steamers, below.
1 very fresh English or other cucumber
a small amount smoked ham, minced (optional, see notes for amounts)
Slice the cucumber into slices of about 1/2 inch/12 mm each. Take care to slice each piece of an equal size, otherwise the slices may cook unevenly.
Bring the steamer water to a boil. While it heats, arrange the cucumbers in overlapping pattern on a heatproof dish or bowl. Place the minced ham over the cucumbers, if using. This need not be perfect.
Once the water is boiling, carefully place the plate atop the rack, place lid on steamer, and steam for 8 minutes.
When the 8 minutes is up, remove lid AWAY FROM YOU. Do not give yourself a steam burn.
Allow cucumbers to cool before eating them right there in the kitchen. For a dish with two ingredients, this is amazingly delicious.
Notes: steamed cucumber does not keep, so don’t make more than you plan to eat right away. If you aren’t sure about servings, keep the water in the steamer warm; these cucumbers are so easy to prepare you can always make more. You’ll probably have to.
It’s hard to give amounts of ham, as I don’t know how much cucumber you’re making. I sliced six slices of cucumber (I made this midday, for blogging purposes), and used one teaspoon of ham. It was plenty.
I make a steamer by placing a rack in a wok bought at a secondhand store. (which is going out of business! Argh!) You can use a lidded pot, too. If you don’t have a rack, an empty can with the ends removed works, as does wadded tinfoil. Author Carolyn Phillips taught me the coin trick: toss pennies into the steamer water. When the water boils, the pennies rattle. This not only allows you to time cooking, it tells you if water levels are getting low.