Monday Menu

Another simple but delicious garden meal…

Tonight’s Menu

Zucchini* Hash

Bulgur

Salad of Baby Greens*

sliced cucumbers*

Zucchini hash was an on-the-spot invention designed to use up some of the veggies in the fridge. I sautéed a chopped onion° and two small chopped carrots°, added diced zucchini* and some corn kernels*. A little salt and yumminess ensued. Served with bulgur.

Salad of baby greens (mizuna, Chinese mustard, arugula, lettuce, spinach, all from the garden)  topped with a foraged apple, goat cheese°and walnuts°.

 

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Monday Menu

The great thing about summer and all the vegetables available is that you don’t really have to do anything complicated or labor-intensive to have a great meal. I suppose the most work in this whole dinner was slicing the vegetables… Even the cooking took less than about 10 minutes!

Menu

Tomato*, mozzarella and basil* salad

Green salad of lettuce° and cucumber*

Grown-up additions to salad: baby chard*, beet*, turnip* and arugula* greens

Yellow squash* and onions°

Corn on the cob°

The first salad is a classic combination, but with tomatoes and basil fresh from the garden it is sublime!

When I was a kid, we used to have zucchini quite often in the summer and we always had it the same way, sliced into  rounds and  sauteed with onions, then topped with melted American cheese. I made this version without cheese and loved pairing the yellow squash with the red onion.

Simple but delicious!

The corn on the cob was a disappointment. I got it at the farmer’s market so it was pretty fresh, but it is not the Jersey sweet corn we enjoyed back home. Still, it wasn’t bad and I think the leftover corn will make great fritters! And we got to use our special corn on the cob boats with cob holders. Last summer when they saw these for the first time in the US, the girls thought these were the neatest things they’d ever seen. So we brought a set back with us!

Classic, cheap, plastic, kitsch…

Oh, the green salad was not photo-worthy. Just salad and cut up cucumbers. I ate the additional grown-up greens too fast to photograph them!

Hope you enjoyed your dinner tonight!

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Monday Menu

We were half way through dinner before I realized it’s Monday!

Menu

Mixed Salad: lettuce°, arugula*, lamb’s quarters*, carrot°, tomato°, chick peas

Pasta° with zucchini* sauce

Like most gardeners who plant zucchini, I have loads and loads of it towards the end of the summer. We haven’t harvested much yet, but more is on the way. I started using it in pasta sauce a couple years ago to use it up and it has become one of the girls’ favorites.

Zucchini Sauce

1 or 2 cups shredded zucchini

onion finely diced or garlic minced, to taste

cream (I use soy cream)

olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

optional: other herbs of choice, grated parmesan

Sautee onion, zucchini and garlic. Add herbs if using, salt and pepper to taste. Add in as much cream as desired. I probably use a quarter cup or so, just enough to make it look like a cream sauce! I suppose you would’t need to use it all if you don’t wish to. Let it simmer a little while. Add parmesan at the end if you wish (I do). Serve on top of pasta or rice.

With more zucchini on its way, look for more zucchini recipes soon, including zucchini muffins and lemon zucchini.

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Monday Menu

We’ve been eating greens!

From left to right, that’s leaf lettuce, a spinach leaf, arugula, Chinese mustard greens and mizuna. I mostly planted arugula – lots of arugula!

I planted polycultures this year and so far, so good! They certainly look beautiful!

The garden is full of greens and we’ve had them lots of ways this week, so I thought I’d share them all.

grape and greens salad* with honey mustard dressing and sesame seeds

omelette with arugula*

boiled potatoes° with a mixture chopped greens*, garlic, olive oil and salt on top

pasta° with goat cheese° and greens*

more salad*, this time with nettle* pesto dressing

more salad*, with kohlrabi° and radishes°

What’s your favorite way to eat fresh greens? I am open to new ideas!

Recipe for Honey Mustard Dressing

Mix about 1/2 cup of oil with a touch of vinegar, ground dried mandarin peel, teaspoon of mustard and dandelion (or regular) honey to taste.

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Monday Menu

Due to celebrating with friends Monday evening, the second installment of my new feature is a day late. Well, it was  a good run while it lasted!

Today’s featured menu comes from Sunday night.

buckwheat kasha with mushrooms° and onions

sauteed grated carrots° with spicy peanut sauce

green salad (meant to have fresh greens from the garden*, but it was raining, and well, you know…)

pumpkin* ice cream

Ack! No photo…but at least a couple of recipes:

All my American cookbooks say to mix buckwheat groats with egg, cook until dry and then add water. But buckwheat is quite common here and the cooking instructions much simpler. Add to boiling salted water, let boil for a minute or two, take off the heat and wrap the covered pot in a towel. Drain and serve. I drained and added to sauteed mushrooms and onions. Two big thumbs up from the peanut gallery on this one! (It made a ton, so I used half in this meal and half the next night in a sort of hamburger helper stove-top, one-pot meal, using buckwheat instead of hamburger. No enthusiastic thumbs up, but they ate it without too  much grumbling!)

The carrots are easy. Grate, saute in a little butter until slightly soft but somehow still crisp. The girls had it plain, but I added spicy peanut sauce.

Spicy Peanut Sauce, from Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites

3 Tbsp peanut butter

1/4 cup water

1 garlic clove, minced

1/2 to 1 fresh chile*, minced

2Tbsp cider vinegar

1 Tbsp honey

1 Tbsp soy sauce

1/4 cup diced tomatoes (I skipped this ingredient – didn’t have any)

2 tsp. grated fresh ginger root

2 Tbsp chopped fresh cilantro (skipped it – don’t like it)

2 tsp fresh lemon juice

Puree in a blender until creamy. Keep in the fridge.

Like I said, the intention was to add the fresh arugula and mustard greens to the store-bought romaine, but I didn’t feel like going out in the rain to get it. If you’re looking for a perfectionistic purist, look elsewhere!

The pumpkin ice cream is so good. It’s your basic ice cream custard with pumpkin puree added. I used the last of my pumpkin from the fall. I added fresh ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg and it s sublime!

Happy eating!

°= from farmer’s market

*= from our garden

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