Watermelon Agua Fresca | Saveur

Welcome to SAVEUR’s weekly column on methods to cook dinner native produce in line with our check kitchen supervisor, Fatima Khawaja. That is the place you’ll discover artistic, unfussy meal concepts plus loads of cooking recommendation—like what to do with that bumper crop of zucchini or methods to retailer delicate heirloom tomatoes. Every week, Fatima hits the farmers market and chooses a peak-season ingredient to discover in depth. Comply with alongside, and also you’ll discover ways to flip the season’s bounty into straightforward plant-based meals that’ll be on the desk in beneath an hour.

In June, I used to be fortunate sufficient to go to Baja, Mexico. I used to be awestruck by the infinite seashores, heat hospitality, and unforgettable eating—but it surely was the produce that actually gained me over. 

The watermelon tasted like my childhood. In Pakistan, there have been at all times bowls of chilly, juicy, cubed melon within the fridge. I’d snack on them within the summertime with the door nonetheless ajar. 

In each Baja and my residence metropolis of Lahore, contemporary fruit juices abound. This recipe for watermelon agua fresca, then, is a type of cross-cultural celebration. The important thing ingredient is salt, which accentuates the melon’s sweetness. 

When shopping for a watermelon, search for the orange “subject spot” on the rind. That’s the place the fruit met the bottom whereas rising. The darker the colour of the sector spot, the extra solar the melon received, that means the sweeter it’ll be. Most grocery retailer watermelons are of the picnic selection, which is striped, giant, and heavy. I typically spot icebox watermelons on the farmers market, that are petite and ideal for one particular person. Each seedless and common watermelon work on this recipe.

Agua frescas are alcohol-free crowd-pleasers for folks of all ages, however they’re additionally an exquisite base for cocktails. In Cabo, I fell in love with the watermelon julep at Flora Farms, a farm-to-table restaurant that grows 115 varieties of fruit and veggies. Discover that recipe here.