Creamed Cucumber Salad - ☺♥

There are many good recipes for creamed cucumbers, along with a few cucumber salad recipes that omit the creamed part. If you like cucumbers they all taste good. The most important parts are to get the right ratio of vinegar and sugar and to allow the completed salad to chill overnight to get all the flavors to blend throughout the sauce. This is especially noticeable with the onion and cucumber flavors. The cream sauce takes on both flavors and that is exactly what you want. The finished sauce should neither be thick or runny, thus the recipe below allows for a variable amount of cream or mayonnaise to be used. Two last points … Do not use thick or overripe cucumbers as they will have wimpy flavor/texture and also have too many large seeds. The best cucumber type for this salad is an English cucumber, about 15" long, and you don't peel it.

Ingredients: (six servings)

2 medium large (8") to large (10") fresh crisp cucumbers, 1 ½ inches thick

1 medium size (3") sweet onion

3/4 cup of Hellman's®mayonnaise

½ cup of sour cream

¼ to ½ cup of light or heavy cream

1 tbsp. of sugar

2 tbsp. of rice vinegar

3/4 tsp. of sea salt

½ tsp. of black pepper

Directions:

Dice the onion fairly fine (1/4"x 1/2" pieces) and put the pieces into a two or three quart bowl. Add the mayonnaise, the sour cream and ¼ cup of light or heavy cream. Mix well. Add the sugar, sea salt, pepper and vinegar and mix well. At this point the sauce may appear too thick. Don’t worry … the cucumber slices you will add next will provide moisture to thin the sauce.

Peel the cucumbers (unless you are using an English cucumber), cut off the ends and slice each cucumber lengthwise into two halves. Slice the halves crosswise with a thickness of less than 1/8^th of an inch. Add the cucumber pieces to the bowl in six increments and mix each time to coat the pieces with the cream sauce. When all the cucumber pieces have been coated the moisture from the cucumbers will have thinned the sauce somewhat. If it has a consistency you like it is done. If it seems too thick then add another 1/4 cup of cream and mix well. If it seems too thin then add another ¼ cup mayonnaise or Miracle Whip® and mix well. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate the salad overnight.

Mix the salad the next day, taste it and adjust the salt, pepper and/or vinegar/sugar to please yourself. I have not found it necessary to adjust the seasonings, but all of us have individual preferences, so please yourself and your guests.

Serve the creamed cucumber salad chilled.

Enjoy!