Seasonal Favorites: Summer Recipes
It's hard to find any apple butter, let alone good apple butter in the grocery store these days. Making apple butter is a great way to preserve the fruits of an apple harvest. In contrast to what the name implies...
For years, this apple cobbler recipe has been one of my father's "signature" apple dishes (knowing my dad, bemused by the thought of his having a "signature" anything, he would probably agree to this statement with dramatic flourish and an...
There is nothing better than homemade applesauce with hand-picked apples, and it is so easy to do! If you want chunky applesauce, use a potato masher to mash the cooked apples. If you prefer smooth apple sauce, run the cooked...
This is a salad of bold flavors, but somehow they all manage to work together well. Sweet corn tossed with peppery arugula, bacon, onion, cumin, and wine vinegar to balance the sweet corn, and you have stimulated all the major...
Every year the mother of my best friend from high school invites me to her 4th of July party. Mrs. Mull knows I like to cook so she encourages me, "Of course you'll bring something wonderful to the party, Elise...
Prep time 10 minutes. Total time 3 hours 10 minutes. This berry and banana terrine is an easy and beautiful way to serve summer berries with bananas for added sweetness. Think Jello but packed with fruit. And instead of neon...
What is it about a black bean salad that practically shouts, "summer potluck"? The mercury has been edging past a hundred degrees lately here and I've been getting nostalgic for some of the picnic foods I remember having often as...
Hanging out with my dad is like living in a test kitchen. Dad's baking experiments are the bane of anyone's low carb diet. One must have formidable willpower to resist his creations, and fortunately for my taste buds, I don't...
There are three things I have a hard time resisting - my dad's tapioca pudding, Belgian dark chocolate, and freshly baked blueberry muffins. Muffins are not as easy to get right as one might think. Too dry, too dense, to...
It's blueberry season! From the recipe archive. ~Elise When blueberries are in season, what better to do with them (other than eating them straight from the basket) than make blueberry pie? Blueberries have been found to be a "superfood", so...
Come late spring, our boysenberry vines start giving up their berries, a few cups a day. What to make with them? Boysenberry cobbler. Quick and easy, this recipe produces a delicious cobbler, a formidable blow to any low carb diet...
Boxes filled with cucumbers from the farmers market, scores of mason jars, big pots, lots of activity in the kitchen, fresh homemade pickles. These are some of my memories from summers growing up. My grandmother (dad's mother) and my parents...
The problem with most broccoli salads is the broccoli - the raw broccoli. Some people like raw broccoli, and actually, I love raw broccoli stems. They taste a lot like cabbage or cauliflower. But the florets? If they're raw, keep...
Ah, the bounty of summer. Italian bruschetta (pronounced "brusketta") is a wonderful way to capture the flavors of ripe summer tomatoes, fresh garden basil, and garlic. I had this the other night at my friend Suzanne's house where her friend...
Recently at dinner my father instructed me, "tell your website readers that your dad says this is a good one." Done, dad. This chicken was good - perfectly tender, well flavored, crunchy - just what one wants in fried chicken...
Still on vacation visiting friends here and here. Not much time to cook, too busy lollygagging. In the meantime, here's another favorite from the archives, ceviche, one of the best possible things one can prepare with a fillet of fresh...
Zucchini and fresh tomato slices make this a perfect summer sandwich. The recipe calls for chicken, but it would probably also work perfectly well with ham. Either focaccia or ciabatta bread can be used; this time we used ciabatta.
Fresh summer tomatoes, garbanzo beans (also known as chickpeas), hard boiled eggs, and sweet onions, tossed with a light vinaigrette - here are the makings of a surprisingly delicious summer salad. I made this for lunch yesterday from a recipe...
This delightful cold pea salad recipe comes from my friend Chigiy's friend Beth, who brought it to a recent BBQ. It calls for Smokehouse Almonds, but I think it could easily be made with tamari almonds too. Perfect for picnics...
My father made this cold tomato and zucchini soup the other day. "Don't call it gazpacho." "Why not? It looks like gazpacho, but with some zucchini." "It's my soup. I made it up. It's not gazpacho. Don't call it gazpacho...
With sweet, fresh corn, still available at the local farmers market, we just couldn't resist trying our hands at some fresh corn chowder. The recipe is adapted from one by Mitchell Davis in Kitchen Sense and is full of flavor...
Corn season has finally arrived. This morning my father picked up some yellow corn from the local farmer's market that was so fresh we could eat it raw. Must have been picked this morning. Did you know you could eat...
When the hot weather hits, nothing is more cooling than a cucumber salad. Inspired by a fabulous cucumber salad shared with a friend at the Sea Salt restaurant in Berkeley, I canvassed my neighborhood grocers for some delicate Persian cucumbers...
We eat a lot of hot and spicy dishes around here; a great way to cool the palate is with the delicious combination of yogurt and cucumber. This easy-to-make cucumber salad, also called "tzatziki", is a refreshing accompaniment to spicy...
Let me preface this recipe by saying my dad is not Greek. But this is our family's rendition of a Greek salad and it is one of our standby favorites. The original recipe came from Bon Appetit, but it has...
A month ago or so I made some potato salad. I love potato salad and was well pleased with this one. Then the next week my father made his version of potato salad. It was great! Better than mine. The...
Deviled eggs. Easter egg hunts and summer picnic potlucks. I have been known to devour a dozen of these in one sitting. These were quick and easy. If you want them to be a little prettier, put the egg filling...
Well, summer has finally come to Sacramento. After weeks of remarkably pleasant 80-degree weather, the hundreds have arrived. Yesterday 108°F. Today, 104°F. And when the mercury goes up, the grill comes out. Who wants to heat up the kitchen when...
The trick to Eggplant Parmesan is to drain the eggplant slices of excess moisture first, before cooking. We found this recipe recently in the New York Times and adapted it to our taste (olive oil only - no canola oil...
Another one from the recipe archives, first posted in 2004. Even though my father doesn't like eggplant in general, he loves this terrine from Jacques Pepin and we've made it several times. Once he even insisted in making it during...
Every year we plant basil and every year the plants do so well that we can't use it up fast enough. What to do? Basil pesto, of course! Here is a simple recipe. Note that pesto is always made to...
A standard and almost necessary accompaniment to most Mexican food is salsa. Salsa (meaning "sauce" in Spanish) comes in many different ways, the most common being chopped tomatoes, onions and chile. Growing up with a Hispanic mom from Tucson, we...
Gazpacho soup was invented for the summer. Refreshingly cold on hot summer days, this adaptation of the classic Spanish cold tomato soup deliciously combines the best of summer vegetables. Make sure you only use the freshest, highest quality ingredients for...
I remarked to my father than we had been doing a lot of salads and veggies lately and without missing a beat dad said, "I want to make stuffed hot dogs," adding, "on the grill," pointing to a particularly appetizing...
The first time I tried grilling corn-on-the-cob, by placing shucked corn directly on the grill, the results weren't all that stellar. Too dried out and chewy. I consulted "She-who-knows-everything-when-it-comes-to-home-cooking" (a.k.a. mom) who informed me the way to do it was...
Recipe updated July 10, 2007 Flank steak is a lean, somewhat tough but flavorful cut of beef that benefits from the tenderizing effects of a marinade. It is best cooked medium rare and thinly sliced at an angle. It actually...
Summer is tomato and basil season, and there is nothing better than heirloom tomatoes with fresh basil from the garden and fresh mozzarella cheese. What are "heirloom tomatoes"? Heirloom tomatoes are what tomatoes used to be before all of the...
Is there nothing better than an ice-cold popsicle on a sweltering summer day? No need to wait for the icecream man's truck to make a pass through your neighborhood. It is easy to make your own popsicles. Do you make...
Who says strawberries have a monopoly on shortcake desserts? Mid summer is the season for many varieties of blackberries, which are delicious served over biscuits with whipped cream. Sweet and juicy marionberries are native of Oregon, but we found some...
Every year in mid July the nectarines on our white nectarine tree become ripe, all at once, and we harvest them all within the space of a week. White nectarines and white peaches grown at home are so delicate that...
The word primavera refers to being served with fresh vegetables; it is from the Italian (alla) primavera, or (in the) spring (style). Pasta primavera is almost always a simple-to-prepare dish using the fresh vegetables of the season. In spring you...
Preparation time: 20 minutes. My mother is the only person I have ever known who can make summer squash taste this good. Often this time of year gardens are overflowing with zucchini and summer squash. This quick and easy recipe...
When it's apple season here in Northern California, we are picking and processing daily from our trees (3 trees, 15 varieties). Of the many apple recipes we have on the site, this is one of my favorites. You simply cannot...
It is getting to the end of the peach and nectarine season here. I picked the last 4 ripe yellow nectarines from our tree today. But what to do with them? Inspiration came from a recent food blogger picnic where...
I was inspired by reading this post at Weddings and Food to make some pink lemonade today. Isn't it pretty? I think it is a little pinker than what we used to get frozen in the can growing up. Why...
My friends know me well. They know if they invite me over and I see that they have bushels of fresh-picked peaches just waiting for a home that I will offer my own kitchen counter space to take some of...
Everybody knows how to make lemonade, right? Squeeze some lemons, add sugar and water. But how to make lemonade so that it tastes right everytime? Here's a surefire method. Remember the starting proportions - 1 cup of sugar, 1 cup...
What to do with Santa Rosa plums? One easy and absolutely delicious possibility is plum cobbler. This was so good, we're making it again tomorrow. (Have to do something with all these plums!)
My July/August issue of Everyday Food arrived yesterday and in it, a simple recipe for potato salad. Too simple in my opinion. The recipe also called for reduced-fat sour cream and light mayonnaise. I'm sorry folks but I don't do...
Summer is the season for cookouts and potato salad, isn't it? Our standard usually includes pickle juice and hard boiled eggs. Here's a completely different take on a summer potato salad, seasoned with mustard, bacon, and the taste that makes...
A perfect summertime appetizer, prosciutto-wrapped melon is a delicious blend of salty and sweet flavors. Mozzarella balls adds another touch. You may want to serve some with the mozzarella, some without. Or, try wrapping some prosciutto around the mozzarella.
Often this time of year, our gardens are filled with more zucchini than we know what to do with. Here is one quick and easy way of preparing zucchini. I had a variation of this the other night at my...
Here's a salmon dish made for summer. Fresh tomatoes, fresh chopped herbs, a few shallots, lemon juice, balsamic and olive oil make a perfect sauce to accompany baked salmon fillets.
Hot days are upon us. A great way to cool off is with a refreshingly chilled salmon salad. This salad is also one way to use up leftover salmon from a summer barbecue. Easy and quick.
From the recipe archive for the hot days of summer. With the warm days of summer upon us, a great way to cool off is with ceviche. Ceviche is typically made with red snapper that is "cooked" by the acidity...
What better way to cool down in the heat of summer than with a delicious cold salad? Freshly cooked shrimp and creamy avocado are a perfect match, especially with a crisp vinaigrette. The best news? It only takes a few...
What would be your dream diet? You know, the diet in which you could really eat anything you wanted, and as much as you wanted. If you asked me at dinner tonight, I would have to say, spicy corn fritters...
Classic Tex Mex, fajitas (pronounced fah-hee-tas) are typically made with grilled strips of skirt steak with onions and bell peppers, and served sizzling hot with fresh tortillas, guacamole, sour cream, and salsa. You can make fajitas with steak or chicken...
Stewed tomatoes is one dish I've never had any place but at home, cooked by my mother. I've never seen them on a menu anywhere, have you? Too bad, too; as they are truly delicious, and so easy to make...
What better way to conjure up memories of the joys of youth than strawberry shortcake? Strawberry shortcake consists of sliced strawberries that have been macerated with whipped cream served over a white cake or biscuit. I'm from the camp that...
Head into any taqueria here in the West and likely you'll find agua fresca (translated literally "fresh water") for sale as well. The standard flavors are tamarindo (made with tamarind), horchata (rice and cinnamon), and jamaica (hibiscus), but you can...
Starting in September around here, people who grow zucchini in their garden begin to discover super-sized zukes that somehow missed getting picked earlier and just kept on growing. My mother's friend Claire gave us such a monster zucchini from her...
Just got back from the BlogHer conference to find a 3 pound zucchini in the garden! Fortunately I remembered this recipe from our recipe archive (originally posted in August 2007). Have a favorite stuffed zucchini recipe? Please let us know...
Every time I take a cooking class from Sacramento chef Evie Lieb I'm inspired for weeks with new ideas and recipes for bringing out the best from ingredients. This summer pea soup is an Evie inspiration, a re-creation of soup...
Evie suspected that when I tried her summer squash salad recipe that I would have to eat my words (no pun intended) regarding my mom being the only one who could prepare squash well. Well, I have eaten my words...
One of the great things about going on vacation is I get to hang out with my friends, and sometimes meet their friends, who sometimes have OMG-this-is-so-GOOD dishes that they bring over. This tomato pie recipe is a result of...
In spite of the unusually poor tomato season this summer (mild summer translates into not enough heat for their ripening) we have still managed a bountiful harvest from our garden. And while the taste of our raw garden tomatoes might...
Why I didn't think of this earlier in the summer, when the zucchini beast was putting out two zukes a day, I don't know. But here it is, a veggie taco that combines the best of summer produce, that you...
Every weekend during the summer, if we are lucky, there will be a good supply of wax beans at the farmers market. These golden yellow (and sometimes purple) versions of green beans are harvested young, and are sweet and tender...
If you've ever grown cherry tomatoes in your garden, you know how wonderfully prolific they can be in summer months. The following salad combines the sweetness of summer cherry tomatoes with white beans and parsley. The secret sauce is the...
I still remember the first time I encountered zucchini bread as a teenager. I had a hard time getting my mind around the concept. At the time, zucchini was something my mom made me eat, and not anything you would...
Zucchini season is upon us, and already neighbors are coming by with bounty to share. Here is a favorite recipe for zucchini fritters, which look a lot like potato latkes, except without the potato. A tasty, easy option if you...
Now that we are living in the land of zucchini plenty (our zucchini plant is well along in its mission of total garden domination) we have ample opportunity to try out zucchini recipes. I've been experimenting with muffins and have...
My father found a recipe for zucchini sautéed in butter and olive oil with onion, parsley, and thyme in one of his decade-old Food and Wine magazines. He made it a few days ago and it was perfect - tender...
