Semi-fresh spaghetti sauce. 7/27/19

Posted on July 28, 2019 by Beebamom

I used my last container of frozen spaghetti sauce for our dinner on Saturday night. Knowing that we would be facing a tomato glut by this point in the summer, I filled each container only half full so that my sauce could be enhanced by fresh tomatoes when I went to use it.

I used two of our daughter’s fully ripened green tomatoes which are gargantuan, each weighing around a pound. Zapping them in the microwave loosened the skin and I also de-seeded them ( mostly.) While de-seeding, skinning, and cutting them up for the sauce I always work over a colander on a bowl so most of the juice is caught. These tomatoes were really juicy and I ended up with a thinner sauce than I wanted so I had to simmer it down for 30 minutes.

Wow, what an intensely bright and tomato-y sauce resulted! John made 8 ounces of whole grain linguine which gave us plenty of pasta for tonight and leftovers for lunch tomorrow!

Linguine with semi-fresh pasta sauce and garnished with cherry tomatoes and parmesan cheese

P.S. Always finish cooking the pasta in your sauce!!

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Gazpacho starter. 7/26/19

Posted on July 27, 2019 by Beebamom

Earlier this week when we had gazpacho we did not finish all of it. So I put it in the refrigerator where it became the starter, much like the sourdough starter we also have in our refrigerator, of a new batch of soup for tonight. Each batch is a little different from the last. Where I had a serrano chile to put in the last blenderful, this time I used cayenne pepper and some smoky chipotle powder. I added a couple of green tomatoes along with a red one and a half of a cucumber so the color is a little different. I chopped up some cilantro to dress the top.

Today’s gazpacho

I also made avocado toast with chopped cherry tomatoes and cilantro on top. My poor avocado had been sitting patiently waiting to be eaten this week and started to  become over-ripe. So it lost some of its vibrant green color.

Avocado toast

We finished the gazpacho so no more this week! I shall make spaghetti sauce from our bountiful tomatoes instead!

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While the A/C was broken. 7/25/19

Posted on July 26, 2019 by Beebamom

We have been shuttering ourselves in the house while the air conditioning has been broken. We get up early and open the house up while it’s cool and then we are hermits for the rest of the day – no cooking, no lights, no television – nothing that will heat up the house.

On Wednesday we went out to dinner to avoid heating up the kitchen. We both had eggplant in corozza. It came in two stacks and we both brought one home. I loved their tomato sauce. It was sweet and tart.

I am taking home half my eggplant

Finally the repairman came on Thursday and we have coolth again. However I neglected to defrost anything for dinner so we finished up our bratwurst. We had them two ways—on a roll with yellow mustard, relish, and onions and without a roll with whole grain mustard, onion, and sauerkraut. Yum, very enjoyable!

Brats two ways!

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Caprese salad and more. 7/23/19

Posted on July 24, 2019 by Beebamom

On Tuesday we used our bountiful tomatoes for Caprese salad. The salad is simply slices of tomato and mozzarella, a sprinkling of basil, and olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Oh, and don’t forget the salt! My salad looks like the Italian flag due to a variety of tomato that is green when ripe.

Caprese salad

Following our salad first course we ate grilled chicken thighs with broccoli salad. We have decided that we like chicken thighs much better than chicken breasts. They are juicier and have more flavor. We get boneless skinless ones and John trims the fat. I am willing to spend a few more calories for more flavor!

Grilled chicken thighs with a sweet and sour broccoli salad with celery seed

Our air conditioner has broken at a very inconvenient time with the temperatures rising to near 100F on Wednesday. We have made the decision to go out to dinner on Wednesday evening to avoid heating up the house with any sort of cooking. Repairman comes on Thursday.

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Best of the season tomato gazpacho. 7/23/19

Posted on July 23, 2019 by Beebamom

We are swimming in tomatoes here.  Three of us against about 5 pounds of tomatoes a day. Every day I get the same plea, “Mom, eat the tomatoes!” So two things that use up tomatoes are gazpacho and spaghetti sauce. It’s hot so I opt for gazpacho again.

My gazpacho is an adaptation of  “The Best Gazpacho” from the NYTimes Cooking site. But I use what I have at hand. No cucumber today so, oh well, how much does cucumber bring to the party after all? There is probably a good three pounds of tomatoes of all types, seeded by not skinned. I use a whole Serrano pepper, pretty spicy. Also onion, garlic, vinegar, and olive oil. A ton of salt helps bring out the flavors. Blender whirs away on liquify. There is still a bit of texture left. We like it that way. Chill.

We top ours with our good olive oil, some basil from the garden, and bits of Serrano pepper. We were supposed to be eating avocado toast but instead we ate two bowls of gazpacho and called it quits.

Gazpacho

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Lunar take-out. 7/20/19

Posted on July 22, 2019 by Beebamom

Happy Moon Day! I remember sitting on a roof balcony of a fraternity at MIT with my then boyfriend when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. It was amazing! Later I learned that my now husband, John, worked on the software for Apollo 11 when he was an undergrad at MIT. Young people were definitely in the forefront of technology!

But back to food! We took the easy route to dinner on Saturday by getting take-out from our favorite Chinese restaurant. The Mongolian beef we ordered was just not spicy enough so I fixed mine up with hot mustard and sriracha!

Diet tip! Unless you are really proficient in your use of chopsticks try using a pair when you are eating. The chopsticks really slow dinners down. It gives your brain a chance to realize you are full!

Doctored Mongolian beef

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More favorite food. 7/19/19

Posted on July 20, 2019 by Beebamom

Yesterday when I was talking about America’s favorite foods I mentioned “any kind of pasta.” So that is what we ate on Friday. We had the ends of two boxes of pasta, one whole grain spaghetti and one spaghetti rigate or spaghetti that has groves running down the length of it. John had to juggle the cooking times but it came out a perfect al dente.

For my part I defrosted a container of my meat sauce to which I added three peeled and de-seeded homegrown tomatoes. I whizzed them up a bit with a stick blender and added salt and oregano. The sauce was spectacular.

BTW did you know you can peel tomatoes easily by sticking them in the microwave for 30 seconds to 1 minute? Just cut x’s into either end. Let the tomatoes cool down a minute or two before peeling. No more pots of boiling water!B4D447A8-F342-47BB-A4AF-ED8E32EC2C0D

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America’s favorite food? 7/18/19

Posted on July 19, 2019 by Beebamom

I was watching Guy’s Grocery Games the other night (it is embarrassing to admit that I watch this program but I do) and he was having a burger battle. He said that America’s favorite food is a burger and probably more precisely a beef burger. It made me stop and think about what my favorite food is. Certainly a hamburger is up near the top, also pizza, and almost any kind of pasta, the kids might say tacos, and truly I could probably finish off a loaf of freshly baked bread. But okay, I am willing to go along with the burger and I was pretty excited about having one since, as I look through my blog, we have not grilled a beef burger since May 6th!

John makes an excellent juicy burger on the grill and I make an excellent tomato, cucumber, and red onion salad. I am using our daughter’s fabulous home-grown tomatoes for the salad.

It is so satisfying to have America’s favorite food for dinner!

Grilled hamburger and fresh tomato cucumber salad garnished with feta cheese

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Fancy dinner is sad. 7/16 and 7/17/19

Posted on July 18, 2019 by Beebamom

We went out for an over-the-top fancy dinner for our anniversary and it turned out to be an overhyped, too expensive experience. The presentations were exquisite but the food became bland and repetitious. So after posting one picture I’ll move on to last night’s dinner.Even though it is nice to go out, I think John and I have more fun just making our own dinners.

This dish is called Early Summer in Sonoma. It is Japanese inspired and is mostly sashimi style fish

We made pizza again last night because I needed to use up the dough. I think we did a better job of stretching out the pizza dough but ended up with a pretty charred pizza at the end. I think we need to turn off one side of the grill and put the pizza on the less blazing side of the grill.

Charred pizza

Finally, a garden update: our daughter brought home 6 pounds of tomatoes today. I have no idea how we are going to eat them all. We are currently eating tomatoes with everything! They are so delicious!

Bountiful tomatoes and lemons

 

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Two new salads for hot nights. 7/15/19

Posted on July 16, 2019 by Beebamom

While we are having the same old chicken, thighs on the grill, at least I made a couple of new salads. The first, Chickpea Salad with Yogurt Dressing, is definitely a keeper. The other one, Snow Pea Salad, is less so. The thing I like about the chickpea salad is that it is a fine replacement for potato salad except there is no cooking and it is lighter with its Greek yogurt dressing. Mashing some of the chickpeas adds to the creaminess.

Chickpea salad with a Greek yogurt dressing and herbs

And here is the other salad. It is a refreshing, lemony combo of cucumbers and snow peas. There are also almonds which give it texture but I would pass on them next time.

Snow pea and cucumber salad

Just want to say that John did a great job cooking the chicken. Grilled chicken thighs are definitely my favorite way to eat chicken in the summer!

Grilled chicken thighs, chickpea salad, and snow pea cucumber salad

And speaking of John, he gave me these beautiful yellow roses today in celebration of our anniversary on Wednesday! We will be married 47 years !! Since it seems like most of the readers of my blog are much younger than 47, the idea of being married for 47 years is probably mind boggling. We are still having a great life. Both of us are getting older at the same rate so changes are gradual. And now that we are older there is time for traveling, enjoying our kids and grandkids, and of course cooking together every day.

Happy 47th wedding. anniversary to John and me!

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