Lisa: Taste of Summer

Wow, summer flew by. Here's a glimpse of what we've been eating. I love all of the fresh, bright colors of summer fruits and vegetables. Salads and wraps became standard fare for a stretch, and I got to try some interesting desserts at picnics. Finally, we grew some of our own produce and indulged in some icy homemade treats.

Romaine salad with carrots, heirloom tomatoes, strawberries,
yellow bell pepper, slivered almonds, carrots and grapes.

Chicken lettuce wraps with salsa and yellow bell peppers,
sugar snap peas on the side

Ricotta and spinach ravioli with marinara,
steamed broccoli, roasted red and yellow beats with goat cheese
par-baked french bread baked just in time for dinner

Grilled salmon (sorry, I mangled it taking it off the serving plate),
Japanese rice with furikake (seaweed and sesame seasoning),
caprese of heirloom tomatoes, mini mozzarella, basil,
green beans goma ae (sesame-soy dressing),
and strawberries

Spinach and jack cheese crepe

I did not make these, but tried them at a picnic:
chocolate-peanut butter-rice crisp bars
with graham cracker crust

My cousin made these:
"Watermelon" Rice Krispies treats
with chocolate chip "seeds"
Made in a round pan and cut in wedges

Massive blackberry!

Watermelon growing in our yard. We later harvested several.
Tasty, but had a tough time figuring out
when they were ripe.

Cantaloupes growing in our yard

Blackberries and strawberries
picked at a local farm

Kale-berry-banana smoothie
popsicle in shape of ladybug

Bernadette: back to the kitchen

With more than a week of illnesses by various members of the family, including a case of pneumonia, as well as a move earlier this week, we've been eating out - or ordering in - a lot. Too much. So I'm looking forward to some very simple to make, home cooked meals.

Today, lunch was a bit random with PB&J sandwiches for the toddler and leftover pasta for me, but I served a little mango before we dug into our respective entrees. This particular mango was one of the smaller, yellow champagne mangoes which are sweeter than the big green and red ones. The toddler has loved mangoes ever since she could eat finger food but for some reason I haven't bought them for awhile. Growing up, we always just sliced the mangoes into slivers, but years back, I saw Martha Stewart serve up mangoes in a much prettier way.

The toddler refers to mangos served up this way as "puzzles."

The presentation delighted the toddler and she's getting the knack of taking her spoon to scoop off the cube of her choice. I still have to help her a bit though since she can get a little fastidious at meal times.

I also finally figured out where the movers stowed the slow cooker and made beef and black bean chili. I used the precut beef stew meat from the butcher and plopped it into the slow cooker along with the black beans, red onion, garlic, chili powder, salt, pepper, and 2 cups of water. Eight hours later, the toddler refused to touch it so she had pasta noodles and the husband and I had delicious chili. The recipe recommends topping the chili with diced red onion and sour cream but the husband topped his with pasta (weird because I would think pasta would go on the bottom) and I topped mine with sliced avocado and shredded colby jack. I like this recipe a lot because it's 10 minutes of prep for a big, hearty meal packed with a lot of rich flavor.

My food photography skills need a bit of work.

We're going to eat leftovers til I figure out the next batch of dinners. I'll re-form the leftovers from our turkey taco night earlier this week into turkey taco salad and eat more chili. As for next week, I've only decided on making linguini with avocado and arugula pesto and will figure out the rest later.