Watermelon Madness 🍉

A Summer Fruit Salad that will blow your mind 🤯

Greetings Friends, 💥

Just in time for the 🇺🇸 holiday weekend, I’ve got a mind blowing summer fruit salad that would be perfect for any BBQ or backyard cookout using one of the season’s most popular fruits…

The Watermelon 🍉

Before your eyes glaze over, hang with me.

This salad is unique because we are going to contrast the natural sweetness of the watermelon with ingredients that are salty (feta cheese), tangy (rice wine vinegar), slightly bittering (extra virgin olive oil) and an aromatic herb (mint).

Sound odd? Trust me… it’s magically delicious!

Served chilled, this refreshing and flavor-bomb fruit salad is the perfect sidekick for grilled meats, BBQ and even hot dogs.

Let’s talk Watermelon 🍉

Watermelon

Without getting into the weeds, here’s a brief TLDR with some watermelon basics. There are many types, including seeded and seedless. Further, people are often confused on how to pick a good watermelon at the store so we’ll get that all covered.

Types

There are over 50 types of watermelon varieties on record. That’s a lot of watermelon to talk about so let’s just stick to the 4 most common types.

Picnic

This is the “classic” watermelon that most people think of green. A green rind, deep red flesh with a round or oblong shape. This variety also tends to be larger, ranging anywhere from 15 to a whopping 45lbs.

Specific varieties would be Charleston Gray, Allsweet and Crimson Sweet.

Icebox

A much smaller type of watermelon, the Icebox was bred for smaller families as well as individuals to enjoy. They weigh in much smaller ranging between 5-15lbs. The rind color can vary depending on the varietal from golden to dark green. All should have that characteristic sweet flesh.

This is the perfect size if you are limited on space or don’t want to store a larger watermelon’s leftovers.

Yellow/Orange Fleshed

This type can come in seedless or seeded varieties. As the name denotes, the flesh will be a yellow or orange color. These yellow/orange fleshed watermelons can be sweeter than the Icebox or Picnic’s, with a honey-like finish.

Seedless

Seedless watermelons weren’t introduced until the 1990’s. The primary reason for the breeding of seedless varieties was to appeal to consumers who dislike the seeds of classic watermelon types.

Seedless watermelon’s aren’t seedless. The seeds that they do contain are just immature, underdeveloped, soft and completely edible.

Seeded vs Seedless

The great debate! Purists tell you that seeded watermelons have more flavor.

Seedless enthusiasts will say theirs are just as sweet.

The answer is that, all things being equal… the climate, weather and growing conditions matter far more than the seed content.

The best thing you can do is buy a fully ripe watermelon, from whatever selection you have have available to choose from.

How can you tell?

Let’s talk about that.

Buying

You’re in the store and you see people tapping and thumping on watermelons.. and you think… “wuuut?” 👀

While there is some truth to the tapping on the watermelon and picking by sound, this is a really subjective metric. We can do better.

Here’s a few reliable ways to get a good melon.

1. Check the stem end. If it is green, this means the watermelon was picked before fully ripe… no bueno! If the stem is brown, this means the watermelon fully ripened while on the vine.

2. Look for a large yellow spot somewhere on the watermelon. If there is no yellow spot, or a dull white spot, this means the watermelon was not in the sun long enough to ripen and develop sugars.

3. Poke test: press firmly on the watermelon rind. If there is a slight give, then that means the melon is ripe. A rock hard melon is not ripe.

4. Finally the sound test, for those interested. A hollow sound when you tap the watermelon with your knuckles indicates that melon is full of water, and good for eating.

Uses

Flesh:

Everyone is familiar with eating cubed watermelon raw. There are other options though. You can juice the flesh for beverages and even freeze the cubed melon to blend up and make boozy summer rum slushies 🍹 👀

If you have a vacuum chamber that pulls 100% vacuum, you can compress the watermelon and then grill. Much harder to do without a vacuum but it can still be fun.

Rind:

This is the most underrated part of the melon. Remove the green exterior with a peeler and you’re left with a thick, whitish, dense rind that is a great canvas for many things.

Pickles: Make a hot brine, pour over the rind and leave to pickle in the fridge.

Kimchi: Take the rind and make a kimchi with it, using the flesh as part of the liquid pickling component (more in this in an upcoming Substack).

Relish: You can finely chop (or put through a meat grinder with a large die) and cook in a sweet-sour liquid to make a delicious relish.

Preserves: Cook down cubed rind in a preserving syrup that is great spooned over cream cheese, and eaten on crackers as a summertime starter.

Steak 🥩 : While not practical in a home kitchen, you can treat the the rind as a steak. This was poached, then cold smoked, then pan seared and basted… making a faux-steak that was a lot of fun and tasty.

There’s more but you get the idea of how flexible and fun the rind is.

Storing Leftovers

Cut watermelon will easily keep for a few days and then will start to break down. This is more a texture degrading than a spoilage. In fact, you’re good for over a week of fridge storage, if it lasts that long.

Freezing cubed watermelon is a great option. Put the cubes on a sheet pan and freeze, then combine then in ziploc bag to save space. (Freezing on the sheet tray prevents the pieces freezing into a huge mass.

Preservation as stated above is also good to avoid waste and enjoy for months down the road.

RECIPE TIME 📝 ⬇️

Watermelon Salad 🍉 🥗

This is a perfect example of combining the flavor wheel of tastes to make delicious food.

For a full rundown on the flavor senses check this previous substack on understanding flavors.

The salad is best made right before serving, allowing 15-30 mins for the flavors to marry. If you make the day before the mint will turn brown and the acid in the vinegar can start breaking down the watermelon.

I find the EVOO essential to add a slight bittering note and also enriching the salad with the healthy fat.

Feta cheese is best found at middle eastern markets where it’s cut to order and doused in it’s brine. There are many types of feta. I love Bulgarian 🇧🇬 , it’s very tangy and snappy. French 🇫🇷 is also delcious, it’s tang more subdued and creamier.

Rice wine vinegar adds acid without being assertive. I’m not a fan of balsamic, apple cider, red wine, or sherry wine vinegar in this case.

Fresh mint is essential, dried won’t even come close. Wrap the leaves into a tight package and slice thinly (chiffonade) right before assembling. Middle Eastern market, again, best place to get fresh mint and it’s cheap. <$1 for a generous bunch.

Some people like to add cucumber, you can. As well as red onion (thinly sliced, pole to pole like we did in the Ceviche recipe).

Finishing with flaky sea salt, like Maldon, adds a great saline crunch. Highly recommend. If not using a finishing salt, add a pinch of sea salt.

Most importantly, enjoy this Summer gem! 🍉 🥗

*Scale up as necessary

INGREDIENTS

3c chilled watermelon flesh, in cubes no larger than 1.5in

1 TB EVOO

1 TB chiffonade fresh mint

1/2-3/4c crumbled Feta cheese (I like larger cubes that I cut with a paring knife, some of pieces will crumble more during mixing)

2 TB rice wine vinegar

3-4 cracks of white pepper

Maldon sea salt, to taste

METHOD

1. To prepare the watermelon. Cut the watermelon in half, across the center.

   

   

2. Now cut the watermelon into thin wedges. Lay on the cutting board and with a paring knife, cut underneath the white rind to remove the flesh (save the rind!). Now cube and chill the watermelon.

   

3. To make the Salad: Add the watermelon to a large mixing bowl. The oversize bowl allows gentle mixing without crushing the watermelon and feta.

4. Add the vinegar and olive oil, drizzling over the melon. Then scatter the feta, white pepper and mint. (At this time if you are not using a finishing salt, sprinkle the sea salt over).

   

5. With a large spatula, gentle fold the salad together to combine. Taste a cube of watermelon that has some mint and feta on it. The olive oil should be present on the back of the palate, and the vinegar and mint should be perfectly harmonized with the watermelon. If you are using finishing salt, remember the salt will increase after you add when plating.

6. Plate the salad in a bowl or large plate, and drizzle with any liquid left in the mixing bowl. Sprinkle with finishing salt and add extra tiny mint leaves if desired.

   

   

And now you’ve got one of the tastiest summer treats on hand to crush and enjoy. Note the multiple dimensions of sweet, sour, salty, slightly bitter that all come together make a very impactful salad.

The sum is truly greater than the parts… Pure Alchemy! 🙌

Looking forward to dropping another Substack this weekend for you all… it should be a good one… 😉

See you soon!