One Great . . . succotash salad

What is a succotash, anyway? The Miriam-Webster definition is "lima or shell beans and kernels of green corn cooked together." The term apparently came from a Narragansett Indian word, msickquatash, that simply meant "boiled corn kernels."

With definitions that vague, I've always figured you can do pretty much anything you want, as long as you have some version of shell beans and some version of corn. You don't even have to serve it hot, do you?

At a farmer's market on Saturday, I spied a bag of those lovely, green cousins to lima beans, butter beans. Now, speaking of definitions, we could debate all day on the difference between limas and butterbeans. Personally, I think butterbeans are green, smaller and less starchy. I simmered them in a mix of half chicken broth and half water for about 45 minutes and had a nice summer side dish -- and a half-bowl left over. I also had a couple of extra ears of cooked sweet corn, and some very leafy celery.

What to do? For a weeknight side dish, I cut the kernels from the corn and stirred them into the cold butterbeans along with about a 1/4 cup of diced celery. Then I took some of the green celery leaves, sprinkled them with coarse salt and a little olive oil and minced them together into a paste. The leaves have a little bitterness that's a good counter to the sweetness of the corn and beans. After stirring it in, I added a little more olive oil and a squirt of a half-lemon to balance the flavors.

We ended up with a refreshing, chilled succotash salad. Nothing suffering about that.

Succotash Salad

About 2 cups cooked butterbeans (any other tender, cooked shell bean would work)
About 1 cup cooked sweet corn kernels
1/4 cup minced celery
2 tablespoons celery leaves (see note)
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice (about 1/2 lemon)

STIR together the beans, corn and celery in a serving bowl.
PLACE the celery leaves on a cutting board, sprinkle with the salt and add about 1 tablespoon olive oil. Mince, sliding your knife blade over it, to create a herb paste.
STIR that into the vegetable mixture, then add about 1 tablespoon olive oil and the lemon juice. Taste and adjust seasoning.
NOTE: If you don't have celery leaves, you could do the same thing with arugula, or even fresh basil leaves.

YIELD: About 4 servings.

Have you seen corn look like this?

Dried up, no kernels: Some of the ears of corn I've seen lately look like something from drought country. But it's definitely not drought country around here. And except for a couple of inches at the top, the rest of the ear is delicious -- fat, juicy, sweet corn.

So what's causing that odd dry tip? I called Darrell Blackwelder, the director of N.C. Cooperative Extension in Rowan County, to ask.

There are some stories floating around that the ends of the ears aren't getting pollinated because the heavy rains knock off pollen. But that didn't make sense to me: Each silk on an ear of corn represents a kernel of corn. And while corn may not release pollen when it's wet, the pollen is quite sticky and doesn't usually get knocked off by rain.

Blackwelder confirmed all that. Instead, he pointed out that corn ears pollinate from bottom to top. So what I'm seeing is simply corn that is pooped: There's so much rain that it's leaching out the nutrients, particularly nitrogen and potassium, and washing them into the soil. By the time the corn finishes filling out the top of the ear, it's running out of nutrients.

"Corn is a grass and it takes a lot of fertilizer," Blackwelder says. "So much water will just flush it right through."

The real irony: Other than those weird tips, we're having a great year for corn. Drive out into the country, around any corn fields and admire: Tall stalks, lots of green leaves, and corn that is fat and tasty. A lot of other crops are struggling through all this rain, but Blackwelder suggests this is the year to grab a bunch of corn and freeze it. Just trim those weird tops off first.

A food book worth Yelping about

Let me make this clear from the start: I know Hanna Raskin, dating back to her days as the eager young restaurant reviewer at the Mountain Xpress in Asheville, through her travels and travails in alt-weekly newspaper reviewing in Dallas and the Seattle Weekly and right up to her new gig, starting soon, at the Charleston Post & Courier. She's smart, energetic and down to earth.

So partly, I wanted to pass along word about the e-book she wrote while she was between being laid off in Seattle and happily hired in Charleston because she works hard, writes well and deserves to be read.

But the other reason I wanted to highlight "Yelp Help: How to Write Great Online Restaurant Reviews" is because there's more here than just how to write a one-paragraph review that isn't inane. Hanna goes into insider information on what goes on in restaurants, how to develop your writing voice and how to craft information that goes beyond the "I hate this restaurant because I don't like chicken" reviews that haunt too many crowd-sourced reviewing sites and online comments.

If you're a food fan, you don't even have to write online reviews to find it interesting. It might help you experience restaurants differently and hone in on why you like a place or why you don't, even if the review doesn't go any further than your own thoughts.

It's $2.99, it's smart and it's fun. Take a look at the sample at www.amazon.com.

Don't miss these on today's food page

Navigate over to the Observer's Food page to find:

The debut of You Asked For It, Robin Domeier's new column on recipes from local restaurants. She kicks it off with the Cajun Carbonara from Boudreaux's in NoDa. If you've got a request from a local restaurant (chain restaurants usually don't share their recipes), send it to Robin and she'll try to get it.

Corn, glorious corn. Well, this year, corn has been late and because of all the rain making pollen bounce around, you may see more ears that aren't filled out to the end. But even the smaller ears I've had have been wonderful. Get it while you can and make the most with it with this roundup of recipes, tips and corn ideas. On the comments, there's already some debate on an interesting question: Is corn a vegetable or a grain?

If you're going to a potluck, there are some tricky shoals to navigate in what to bring -- and what to take home. Even a Wake Forest expert knows there are powerful issues at stake. Take a look at these tips and guidelines for guests and hosts.

If you don't know the Turkish/Middle Eastern chili paste harissa, this is the time of year to make your own.

Finally, readers always ask for recipes that are simple, quick and sized for two: Linda Gassenheimer's offering this week is Buffalo shrimp.

And we also have our regular useful features: The guide to pick-your-own farms (peaches and blueberries are still going strong); farmers markets all over the region; and our searchable database of recipes with thousands of choices.

Matthews CFM ends Tuesday market night early

Pauline Wood, the manager of the Matthews Community Farmers' Market, sends word that tonight's Tuesday Twilight Market will be the last of the season and you can blame the weather:

"We did intend to hold our Tuesday Twilight Markets through Aug. 6, but it has become clear that would be overreaching given the situation our farmers are in this summer. The continuous wet weather has wreaked havoc on crops, and, in a nutshell, the overabundance farmers usually experience in June and July didn't happen this year."

Tonight's market, held in the usual space at North Trade and John streets in Matthews, will include a demo by Jason Newman, sous chef at Barrington's, and vendors will include Hinson Farms, Garden of the Woods, Willow Oaks Farm, Walnut Ridge Farm, Nut Hill Farm, Baker's Blessings, Quench!Essentials and Ranucci's Big Butt Barbecue. 

Saturday's market hours will remain the same. 

Is your tomato sauce worth bragging about?

It's been a tough year for tomatoes, what with that long, lingering cool spell and weeks of monsoons. So this year, instead of the annual tomato tasting day, the Matthews Community Farmers' Market will hold a marinara contest this Saturday, July 27.

As in their other cooking contests, there will be two rounds of judging:: A People's Choice table, where you can sample and vote, and a professional judging session. Judges for that will be Luca Annunziata of Passion8 Bistro, Joe Bonaparte of the International Culinary Schools of the Art Institute, and cooking teacher/writer  Heidi Billotto.

Entries must be made with tomatoes that are either grown in a home garden or bought from a local farmer's market; each entry has to be accompanied by a whole tomato of each variety used. You should also use as many fresh, locally grown ingredients as you can. To enter, bring your sauce by 9 a.m. Saturday to the market, 208 N. Trade St. in Matthews. Judging starts at 9:15 a.m. Prizes include market gift certificates, tote bags and T-shirts.

Other rules:
No professional chefs or cooks;

All entries must be made from scratch. The marinara sauce should be brought to market warm if

it is a cooked sauce or at room temperature if an uncooked sauce.

Bring a copy of the recipe, including ingredient list, with your name, address and phone number. Index cards taped to submissions work best.

Bring at least a 1/2 gallon of sauce split between two disposable plastic quart containers, for the judges' table and the public tasting table. 

As long as we're on the subject, what's a marinara? For the contest, the market is using this definition:

"A meatless, Southern Italian tomato sauce usually flavored with garlic, onions, herbs and spices. Chunky or smooth, it can have many variations."

Checking it out: Good Bottle Co.

Craft beer is exploding so fast, I can't visit the new businesses fast enough. My latest stop: Good Bottle Co., 125 Remount Road, less than a block from South Boulevard and Ideal Way.

Guys and bikes: Watching the Tour 

I got lucky finding it open when I pulled in on a Thursday on the way back from an interview. It's usually open noon-9 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, but owner Chris Hunt had unlocked the doors a little early so some of his customers could sit at the bar and watch the Tour de France.

So is it a bar or a store? Hunt says the aim is to be both: He stocks a wide selection of bottles and growlers, but there is a small beer bar across the back with seating and a half-dozen taps.

The section of N.C. beers is truly inspiring:  Fullsteam, Mother Earth, Pisgah, French Broad, even Beer With No Name from Raleigh. There is a small section of imports, and that's by design. Hunt said he aims for 85 percent to 90 percent American craft beers.

When he was visiting bottle shops and planning his own, he said, he was really struck by all the stores that said they made a mistake in having too many imports. These days, he says, American craft beer is the way to go. Even with a big section for NC brews, he's running out of room, he says.

"Craft beer should be as local as possible," he says. I'll raise a toast to that.

Follow Hunt on Twitter, @goodbottleco or find him online, www.goodbottleco.com.