LUCY BURDETTE: as you know, summer is creeping up on us and it’s not only a great time for reading (see tomorrow’s post for our reading recommendations), but it’s also a great time for eating! (Although for me, when is a bad time for eating? Never!) Here are some recipes and dishes that I am looking forward to making or eating, or are those that I’ve made recently and loved, and then I would love to hear yours.
First up, a recipe for potato salad with olives from The New York Times cooking app. I made this last summer because I was making a dish for our long time supper club. This skirted all the allergy issues and it turned out so good that everybody wanted the leftovers. I will make it again this weekend.
Lemon lime lavender scones were baked in the upcoming A DELICIOUS DECEPTION by Hayley Snow‘s mother who is catering a wedding for a mother of the bridezilla. So I had to bake them as well and they are lovely. Link on mystery lovers kitchen.
You will want this recipe when tomato season comes along. Luckily in Key West, John grew tomatoes on our deck so we were able to sample this before the summer season. The two of us ate all but once slice and then fought over that the next day. I will definitely make this tomato galette again. LINK on Mystery Lovers Kitchen.
This recipe came from Smitten Kitchen Keepers. I’m a sucker for gnocchi and almost always order it if I see it on a menu. So I wanted to try this new recipe for ricotta gnocchi with a pistachio arugula sauce. It was outstanding! Link to my version here.
I am crazy for jalapeño poppers, but I didn’t see how I would ever make them because I don’t deep fry anything. Then one of my fellow Friends of the Key West library board members showed up with a tray of these poppers for a benefactor event. They are not fried, they are baked, and they look reasonably easy. I will post that recipe as soon as I make them!
OK, Reds, your turn! What will you be cooking or eating this summer? You do not have to actually make it in your own kitchen for this to count.
These all sound delicious, Lucy . . . thanks for the recipes . . . .
ReplyDeleteSummer means we get to grilling, be it hamburgers, chicken, or perhaps even a steak [if we can find a really good sale!] . . . . we'll have potato salad and deviled eggs for sure; definitely macaroni and cheese if the grandbabies are here!
sounds wonderful Joan, we'll be over for dinner!
DeleteThose all look yummy! I love summer produce. When the gold cherry tomatoes and cucumbers are ripe, I'll assemble them with feta, Kalmata olives, fresh oregano, and olive oil for my Greek salad. And when the basil is flourishing and I've harvested the garlic, it's time for batches of pesto. Whenever Ida Rose is in the house, pasta is on the menu for lunch or dinner and blueberry muffins or pancakes for breakfast.
ReplyDeleteI love Greek salad--can't wait for the tomatoes and cukes! I might make blueberry pancakes for supper:)
DeleteI love Greek Salad too! Do you use sheep milk cheese feta? I like it better than cow's milk.
DeleteLooking forward to the jalapeno poppers! Yum and the fact that they are baked is even better.
ReplyDeleteRoberta, I will definitely bake the strawberry cake with strawberry frosting that is in your series, and I think it's in your cookbook, too. I will also make your strawberry coffee cake. It's delicious! I may bake a blueberry pie, which is one of our favorite summer treats! I know that I will bake a lot of treats with summer berries because SUMMER!
ReplyDeleteAs for grilling and salads and appetizers, yeah. But summer means berries.
Local strawberries coming soon!
DeleteSounds great Judy! I love blueberry pie
DeleteLucy the recipes sound delicious and the photos make my mouth water! I look forward to fresh berries, rhubarb, and never soon enough fresh tomatoes, peaches and all the other fresh produce. I don’t cook once it’s reached 75 in the house so husband grills. Grilled vegetables -yum. The baked poppers are ones I will definitely try before it gets too hot! And having all 3 meals on our back deck, looking at the garden beds and watching and listening to the birds!
ReplyDeletethat sounds so lovely. I forgot about the peaches which show up locally in CT in August and September. Love them so much!
DeleteSuzette, have you ever grilled fresh peach halves? Food of the gods, especially with good vanilla ice cream, and a drizzle of blackberry balsamic vinegar.
DeleteFor me, the first day of summer is the first day it is warm enough for me to start my seasonal shift to wearing shorts. That happened earlier this week so HAPPY SUMMER EVERYONE!
ReplyDeleteWhat will I be eating. I will just simply be eating what I always eat. It is the diet that will put me into an early grave but since it will be the years at the end that I'll be losing, I'm not losing sleep over my Bacon Cheeseburger and Chicken Tenders repasts. Sure, I throw in a roast beef sub or ham or turkey sandwiches sometimes as well. And when I really want to get wild, there's always a steak and cheese sub for good measure too.
Sometimes I even get really wild and make eggs or a can of soup or, can you believe it, English muffins. And when I get super ambitious, a bowl of Cheerios does the trick.
The breakfast of not likely to a champion, envy me all you dieting crazy people!
Happy summer Jay!
DeleteThose poppers look very similar to a favorite recipe of mine. I just took them to my card club last weekend and as always, they were a huge hit. Mine is as simple as this: 22 jalapenos sliced in half, stuffed with a mixture of 8 oz. cream cheese, 1 cup parmesan cheese, and 1 lb. loose Italian sausage, browned. Bake at 425° for 20 minutes, when the top should be a golden brown.
ReplyDeleteThree notes: 1) If the jalapenos are running really large, you might only be able to fit 20 on your baking sheet. 2) I usually end up having to reallocate the filling some at the end to get it to come out even, but you really can fill them all nicely with that amount of filling. 3) And from hard personal experience, I strongly recommend wearing latex gloves while making these, as you do not want that jalapeno oil getting into your eyes or anywhere else!
those sound wonderful and so easy. Does anyone complain about the heat of the jalapenos?
DeleteCold shrimp dishes, chicken salad, chicken breasts with red and yellow peppers, egg salad. Time to pull out the Silver Palate cookbook.
ReplyDeleteHa Margaret, I pulled that out this morning for a grilled chicken recipe!
DeleteI will be eating (but those lavender lime scones might tempt me into the kitchen).
ReplyDeletethey were VERY tasty
DeleteWe have a really cute takeout place nearby, and I saw the other day they had shredded snow pea salad with sesame seeds and tiny red tomatoes and toasted sesame oil. It looked so delicious, and it absolutely lived up to the promise! The snow peas were still bright green and crunchy, and it was gorgeous and delicious. I’m not sure it’s worth trying to make myself, when I can just trot down the street and get some more.
ReplyDeleteI also love grilled peaches… When we cook chicken on the grill, we have charcoal, and I just cut peaches in half and throw them on till they turn a little brown on the cut side. And are warm throughout. So incredibly good!
And of course all the tomatoes/Greek salad/shrimp/straw/watermelon stuff. Hooray!
Yes buy the salad Hank! Grilled peaches are a wonderful addition.
DeleteThanks for reminding me to get some sugar snaps (I prefer over snow peas) to slice up in salads, Hank! And that salad sounds delish! I'm going to try making it.
DeleteLucy, I am coming over to your house for lunch. Just kidding! The food photos made me drool. They all look so delicious! In the summertime, they always have these yummy dry farmed tomatoes, which are very good. I notice there are more choices in fresh produce during the summer.
ReplyDeleteMy lunches are often pretty boring Diana:)
DeleteHere the summer begins this weekend as the locally produced asparagus are ready . I like them steamed just right and eat them with only a bit of butter, salt and pepper. No complicated recipes that will camouflage the taste.
ReplyDeleteA couple of weeks later I’m going to devour tons of strawberries, then raspberries, then blueberries, the loves of my life. Again I prefer them naturel or with a bit of yogurt. The season is so short to taste the real thing, I prefer to integrate them in recipes after summer.
It is the same with vegetables like corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, varied lettuces but I also love salads of mixed fresh garden vegetables.
Of course I’ll make lobster rolls a couple of times, a taste I brought back from visiting New England many years ago.
We've been eating John's garden asparagus for the last few weeks, though it's almost done. Usually I just roast with a little olive oil, maybe a dab of sesame oil, and that's that! I won't buy asparagus out of season--too spoiled by this.
DeleteI love how asparagus grows. It is so hilarious.
DeleteYesterday, I printed out the gnocchi recipe to try when we get back from traveling! It looks fabulous, and I will be making additional pistachio/arugula pesto for the freezer.
ReplyDeleteStrawberry shortcake (Bisquik recipe) is a favorite, and we have already had it twice. I have been harvesting nearly a quart a day for two weeks, so now we have berries frozen for later, too.
Because we have had a couple rounds of houseguests, I have already made one batch of potato salad. And I am looking forward to my version of salad nicoise: good tuna, steamed garden beans, fresh tomatoes, lettuce, sliced hardboiled egg, sliced black olives, and a drizzle of olive oil. Couple of grinds of pepper, and chef's kiss. A perfect summer supper, especially with some good bread and a crisp white.
Oh yum, you're such a good hostess Karen!
DeleteLooking forward to gazpacho when tomatoes come in, broccoli salad, stir fry when the farmstand down the road has fresh veggies available.
ReplyDeleteSounds terrific Flora!
DeleteI can’t wait for the jalapeño poppers
ReplyDeleteHere. in MA we are one of the last parts of the country to have fresh grown produce available.
ReplyDeleteEven if it comes from areas such as CA it takes time before it appears around here and transportation cost makes them more expensive. I know my nephew in Oregon pays a fraction of the cost for fruits such as cherries because they are locally grown
There are a lot of fruits and vegetables available during the off season, i.e. winter but they are almost always imported, more expensive and just doesn’t have the same texture and flavor as what we get during the summer.
I am looking forward to the fruits in particular since their appearance is short lived and whether the blueberries, peaches grapes, cherries are baked, cooked or just eaten as is, they are enjoyed since I know by August the season will already be winding down and the prices will rise again for whatever is still available.
I am just curious, I have been seeing a lot of produce which are products of Canada and I was wondering where the growing areas in the country are since Canada is further north and I would think their growing season opportunities would be more limited. They also just seem to be appearing earlier than their availability in this country.
Such a good question! I would love to know too
DeleteI'm moving next weekend, so just plan on easy quick meals for awhile. Every summer I enjoy gazpacho, tabbouleh and other cold salads like chicken, tuna, potato and pasta salads, and eating fresh fruit and berries, (blackberries grow on our property) sometimes making a cobbler in the toaster oven, which won't heat up the kitchen like using the regular oven. I hope to get an air fryer soon, since so many people rave about cooking with them. I still have our old grill and a friend who likes to grill outside, so looking forward to that!
ReplyDeleteThose scones look so delicious, Lucy. I'm not sure I'll get around to making them, but I feel like they would really be a worthwhile effort. I just don't have much of an appetite lately, so I'm not thinking too much about summer foods. Our beloved BLT will probably be on the menu, but for some reason, I'm not wild about bacon like I used to be. Maybe that will change. I do want the strawberries and blueberries in the fruit category. Grilling out is easy, but I am not as much of a meat eater as I was. I will eat a hamburger, but I don't crave it, and steak is more my husband's love than mine. I have become a boring eater. I probably eat scrambled eggs and English muffin four times a week for supper. It's comfort food for me. Now, we do take our Mediterranean cruise (small ship cruise) and stay in Athens four days before and Barcelona two or three days after, so I'm thinking my appetite will be awake for that. We're looking at a cooking class in Athens (also a silk scarf making class), and I adore cafes, so I'll probably rise to the occasion of eating well during that trip.
ReplyDeleteOh Kathy, I bet the greek food will be amazing!
DeleteLucy, all those recipes look so delicious! It was farmer's market morning here. We've been getting all the berries, but I especially love blackberries in season. This morning I bought my first peaches, watermelon, and okra!! I've never deep fried okra, but I used to do the whole messy batter thing and pan fry it. Then I discovered that it's terrific just sliced with salt, pepper, and olive oil and thown in the grill basket, or just a quick saute on the stove top. Yum.
ReplyDeleteYou're so far ahead of us Debs! I love fried okra and luckily John does too. We grow it every year
DeleteNobody has mentioned ice cream. Does anyone make their own? There is a Farmers’ Market here that won’t have locally grown produce for another month or so, but there is an ice cream truck with home-made ice cream and flavors such as orange-pineapple
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone make cold fruit soups? There was a local Hungarian restaurant here that served a cold cherry soup that was very good and I have been to restaurants in other parts of the country that hat have it on the menu, one was in San Diego-it was a cold strawberry soup.
ReplyDeleteI was wondering how complicated it would be to make. I would think it would be refreshing on a. hot summer day. sometimes I will have borscht which is not home made. My mother used to to make it but I was too young to appreciate it. It is nice even as a cold drink rather than a soup in warm weather.
Oh Lucy, you are an AMAZING cook AND eater... Those dishes look fantastic. Those jalapeno poppers in particular. The other night I made an oven baked cod topped with garlic and capers and lemon juice and paprika and salt and pepper. Simple and delicious.
ReplyDeleteWhen we were in NY last week , we ate at a French restaurant that had a warm broccoli rabe appetizer, doused in a sort of garlic butter. Boy would I love to get the recipe. Served with a baguette it could have been dinner.
the cod sounds delish and so does the broccoli rabe!
DeleteStrawberries, watermelon, cantaloupe or muskmelon, and potato salad are the summer foods I adore. And ice cream lots of ice cream.
ReplyDelete