This week’s topic for Think Write Thursday is to share my favorite summer meal ideas, including recipes if applicable. Are you all about the grill? Or maybe do you prefer salads. Do you use your crock-pot a lot in the summer? Or would you rather have sandwiches? Tell us what you’re eating and tell us how you prepare it!
Summer for me is all about fresh. Fresh from the garden. Fresh from the farmer’s market. Fresh.
Part of the challenge is to preserve ‘fresh’ to carry us through the months where fresh has been shipped in from someplace else.
Last night’s harvest
But, for me the best and most important “taste” of summer are tomatoes – there is nothing on this earth that tastes like a fresh from the garden tomato. Strangely, Steve hates tomatoes. I know… what the heck? Anyways, I have tried to alter this with zero success until I found this recipe for Tomato Jam. Really, it is so good and Steve loves it! I make it exactly as the recipe is written. And, trust me when I say that a bit of this in January brings summer rushing back!
The other thing I love are pickles – they are the perfect addition to Happy Hour and my favorite simple recipe is this one by Andrew Zimmern. My only addition to the recipe is ½ to 1 tsp of red pepper flakes to make them sweet and spicy. So good, and when you grow the cucumbers it is even better!
For dinner, tonight I am going to do a “southwest riff” on stuffed peppers. I will cut these peppers in half and fill them with a mixture of black beans, fresh sweet corn, onion, some of my tomato sauce, a little bit of ground beef, and some spices (I will use chili powder, cumin, garlic, salt, and pepper). It is super simple, brown the ground beef. Add the onion and garlic and cook until they are soft. Add the spices and the tomato sauce. Heat through. Spoon over the halved peppers and bake in a 350° F oven for 35 minutes or until the peppers begin to soften a bit and the sauce is bubbly. Top with some low-fat cheese and return to the oven for a few minutes until the cheese has melted. Serve with an ice-cold beer.
What about you? What foods say summer to you?
You will find more good food here. If you want to join Carole and me on Think Write Thursday’s, you can sign up here.
Oh that tomato jam sounds wonderful – thanks for the link. And nothing like fresh pickles!! Enjoy your peppers – they sound really good too.
I’m waiting, waiting, waiting for tomatoes! I can’t wait to have my first BLT. You have some wonderful ideas for summer yummy!
Your pickles and tomatoes are gorgeous, and I so wish I had seen your take on stuffed peppers before I made my boring ones! My garden peppers have never grown large enough to stuff before, and now I’m hoping for more so I can make “Kat’s peppers”. (That’s what they’re called on the recipe card I just wrote.) Thanks!
No big tomatoes here yet but I have picked a few cherry tomatoes this week. I remember the tomato jam from last year and it was wonderful, thanks for the reminder! And I loved stuffed peppers but I find then to be tedious to make.
That tomato jam does sounds good! My daughter puts ketchup on everything, so perhaps this can give her a slightly more sophisticated condiment to try.
I fear your stuffed peppers and my acid reflux would not get along well, though they do sound good. My favorite summer meal is a caprese salad with fresh tomatoes and basil and some crusty bread. For weekday lunches in the summer, I really like a sandwich with fresh mozzarella, avocado, tomato, and a shmear of mayo to keep the bread from getting soggy.
Love a fresh tomato. The only time I eat them is at harvest. I’d try the jam but the cinnamon has me perplexed. I might omit that part.
Summer is all about I dont want to cook. Someone serve me please!!! Or I can have some cereal. 🙂
Both the tomato jam and the stuffed peppers sound delish…any leftovers? I had some organic grape tomatoes – I got from Whole Foods – last week…they were absolutely the best and I ate them all as tho’ they were popcorn…not all at the same time…I held back. ;-))
Cheers~
Yum – thank you for the links!!
I love tomatoes AND pickles. My oldest son never liked tomatoes, it was a texture thing.
That tomato jam looks wonderful. I’ll be making some next week. Thanks for the link.