Tofu, Millet and Courgettes in a Pan: a One-Dish Meal

When I told him it must have been 3, at most 4 in the morning, he had no doubts. According to Antonio, the call that woke us up last night was a stag's bellow.
Because stags make themselves heard in August, and today is the 2nd. In August and September, down from the woods towards Grigno, there are lots of them.

I trust him.
It took him two months to speak to me, I mean to go beyond a simple "hello" and start telling me about himself. That is how I found out there is a long cave running under the village, where children used to sneak in during the 1960s to face their ghosts with lanterns of jute and resin. Because Castello Tesino stands on the border between karst rock and granite, and water wears the rock into hidden underground worlds.

Antonio was a forest ranger, and he mows his lawn every fortnight. His mother bent over gathering wild herbs is one of his childhood memories.
We started chatting last month, when he saw us about to cut down nettles that had grown shoulder-high, armed with a battery-powered strimmer. In a village where everybody knows everybody and, often, everybody argues, I think he liked the naive optimism of our gesture.
Today we spent another half hour together. Having put down our city weapon and relied on the powerful machines of our friend Carlo, it was time for the next level: once the grass is cut, I'll help you plant a vegetable garden next spring.

I had just finished in the garden.

The lemon balm has created an unexpected fragrant undergrowth: under the yellowing, darkening leaves, lots of little lemon balm plants are colonising the flowerbed.

The mint has tripled, but I had no doubts about that. Fearing my lack of a green thumb, I played it safe with an invasive plant.

The sage, the biggest sage bush I have ever seen, has spread all around, and the wild oregano I brought back from the meadows of Celado last August has grown back here and there.

The St John's wort plants are now four.

My Saturday afternoon: a little trim of the tamarisk, a freshly cut hydrangea to bring indoors, some lavender for the next infused oil, and Antonio in the distance, happy because he can finally see beyond the boundary now that the wall of nettles is down.
Like when he was a child and the woods weren't there.
You could see all the way down to the stream, and there was the path to Cinte, walked every day by the students of the woodcarving school who came to Castello to learn the secrets of wood.
Those were the years when there were 3,000 inhabitants and 33 bars.

This recipe celebrates the flavour and different textures of several kinds of courgette, cooked together simply to make a plant-based one-dish meal for every day.
Last week, at the market in Borgo Valsugana, I bought a couple of trombetta courgettes, a couple of knobbly Friulian ones and some Roman courgettes from a lovely lady who grows organic vegetables nearby. I stocked up on all these wonderful varieties because I rarely find so many together. Of course you can use whatever you find: the result is guaranteed anyway!

Dice the tofu and let it marinate in lemon juice for at least half an hour. Wash and trim the courgettes and slice them thinly. Peel and slice the onion; peel, crush and chop the garlic. Cut the sun-dried tomatoes into strips. Put everything in a wok and sauté for a few minutes, then add half a glass of hot water and let it stew. Drain the tofu from the lemon juice and add it. Cook over high heat until the courgettes are tender (but not mushy!). Season with plenty of fresh herbs and the lemon juice you used to marinate the tofu.

I served this dish with millet cooked by absorption, with a ratio of 1 part millet to 2.5 parts water.