These little curly gems are plentiful this time of year here in New Jersey.  They are curly little garlic flower stocks that ironically do not flower.  Scapes, like ramps, can only be found for a short time and that time is NOW in the Jerz.  I found them at the Summit Farmer’s Market last Sunday and I received a bunch of them from the Just Farmed program out of Westfield.  At any rate, I have a ton of them now so luckily they freeze well.  I threw some in the freezer but I’ve been enjoying them in all sorts of different ways.  One basic way to use them is to simply toss them into a salad, finely chopped.  I also made a mayonnaise with scapes that turned out great.  A few weeks back, I posted a recipe for Basil Aioli and the process for making the scape mayonnaise is basically exactly the same.  I’ll post the recipe below.  However, if you are lucky enough to get your hands on a few scapes, you can add them into dishes just as you would regular garlic.  For me, they have a much more mellow flavor than regular raw garlic and evidently the scape flavor mellows even more as they age (frozen or not).  Hopefully though, we can all enjoy this brief seasonal vegetable together as it’s super tasty and, let’s face it…they are curly and fun to boot!

Scape mayonnaise recipe follows after the jump.  Enjoy! Continue reading →