Too Many Cucumbers

Maybe it's because I was getting desperate.  Maybe it's because I've known summers when hardly a handful of cucumbers grew all summer long, so I felt responsible to make full use of every cucumber in this season's BUMPER crop.

 

In any case, recent events gave me the material for yet another blog post following one of this year's themes: processing the EPIC fail.

 

The progression began with my sharing with a friend how I'd left Hubby sitting by the firepit all alone one evening until nearly full dark, all while I canned yet another pickle recipe. Meanwhile, more cucumbers sat in water in the refrigerator waiting for me to work some kind of magic on them, too.  Frankly, I was running out of ideas for what to do with them.

 

My friend asked, "Have you made a cucumber face mask yet?"

 

"No!" I said, excitedly.

So I went online and found myself a reputable-source recipe and set out to make myself a magnificent summer facial.  Oh, I had to make a few adjustments to the recipe, but nothing major.  I had to leave out the vitamin E oil--although I did pop a vitamin E capsule and squeeze  its oil into the concoction.  And I had to leave out the aloe vera gel--we used it all up during that community sunburn we earned the day the family did that 4-hour float trip down the river.  But otherwise, I had everything I needed!

 

Quickly I scanned the ingredient list, dumping all into the blender as I read: 1 peeled cucumber, 1 cup of Greek yogurt, 1 tablespoon of raw honey, (I even had raw honey!) that squirt of vitamin E...

 

Whir. Whir.

 

 

At this point, I began to notice a problem.  I glanced back at the instructions.  "Thick and creamy." Yeah, that's what I thought it said.

I had a very thin cucumber bisque at best.  WHAT HAPPENED?

 

I went back to the recipe.  Alright, I admit when that long paragraph about the benefits of each ingredient started rolling along, I checked out. 

I'm already all in.  I don't need convincing.  I can skip this part.

But, maybe I should have read what followed that paragraph.  Guess I'll read it now, I decided.

 

Oh.

 

I was only supposed to use 2 tablespoons of the cucumber puree after juicing it. 

Hmmm...so not the whole cucumber in the blender...hmmm...

 

 

Time for  some hot tea while I devised some sort of back-up plan.

I sloshed the runny stuff around and thought:  milk bath.  Why not just make it a milk bath?  The yogurt certainly offered milk bath benefits. The honey and cucumber couldn't hurt!  I'd make it a little more complex by adding a cup of Epsom salts and still have my beauty treatment...of a sort.

 

 

I did go ahead and mix up the sugar scrub recommended for use before the cucumber mask.  I wasn't able to "mess it up" seeing it was so very simple. 

1 T sugar.

1 T raw honey.

1 T olive oil.

Mix and scrub on the face. 

That part went exceptionally well.

 

So did the hour of solitude, just me and my milky bath, with the scent of fresh cucumber wafting over to meet the "ocean breeze" oil in my little burner.

 

As for the rest of my excess cucumbers, maybe I'll just follow the advice of one of my young friends:  eat 'em raw like apples!

Not a bad plan.  Apparently, they're pretty nutritious.

 

Bonus blog link:

http://rawforbeauty.com/blog/cucumbers-contain-most-of-the-vitamins-you-need-every-day.html

 

Happy munching!