Ramp Week: Ramp Purée

As ramp week progresses, I think I'm beginning to ooze their garlicky green scent, and I don't apologize to anyone for it! I've also figured out a few things: purées go everywhere, and raw is more intense (which for me=better). So, I decided to sacrifice one bunch of these beautiful babies to a little experiment...a ramp purée to keep on hand in the fridge.

It's basically the easiest thing to do, and exactly what I did for the pizza: I washed, trimmed, and roughly-chopped one bunch of ramps. They went into my food processor, along with 1/4 cup olive oil and a generous pinch of Maldon salt. Whizzz--done! Into a jar...


Digging through the fridge to see what I had on hand that might be a good test for this stuff, I decided to make a simple potato soup from 2 potatoes, 1 onion, 1/2 cup chopped celery, 4 cups of stock, and (after puréeing) 1/4 cup milk and a little salt. I stirred in a generous dollop of my ramp purée, and (who knew?) it worked! Intense rampy goodness. And I suspect when I try it again in the leftovers--this time cold, à la vichyssoise--it'll be even better.