Cucumber recipes

Cucumber is a cheap and quick way to bring freshness to a meal. It is mostly water, which is both its strength and its challenge: salt the sliced cucumber and let it drain for 10–15 minutes so the salad doesn't turn watery and the texture stays crisp.

Among the most popular cucumber recipes are Asian vinegar cucumber salad, pickled cucumber, cucumber relish and yoghurt-based raita. A quick pickling liquid uses a ratio of 3 parts vinegar, 2 parts sugar and 3 parts water: bring it to the boil, pour the hot liquid over the cucumber slices and leave to infuse for at least 30 minutes. Pickled cucumber keeps for about a week in the fridge.

Texture makes all the difference: thin slices suit sandwiches and salads, coarse cubes suit relish, and cucumber smashed with the flat of a knife suits Asian salads, because the broken surface soaks up the dressing better. Cucumber pairs well with dill, mint, sesame, chilli, yoghurt and feta.

Store cucumber in the warmest part of the fridge, not the coldest – below 7 degrees it easily turns watery. In Ruokaboksi's weekly recipes, cucumber is included only when the whole cucumber gets used, so no leftover halves go bad in the fridge.