Springtime Pasta and Beans Two Ways: Zucchini with Lemon, and Spinach with Spring Onions

These are not your mother’s pasta fazool. But true to the peasant origins of the traditional Italian dish, they use seasonal ingredients along with some pantry staples. Just what we need as the earth reawakens in April and spinach and spring onions are found in the market or garden. I made two version of this [...]

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Peppers Stuffed with Corn, Zucchini and Basil

The weather at the end of September has been warm enough for me to continue to appreciate the late summer and early fall harvest of peppers, eggplants, squash, corn and tomatoes, although the fall roots such as celeriac and beets are starting to be available. Peppers are the current season’s prize, arriving large and small, [...]

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Waste Not Want Not – Getting the Most from your Food: Corn Broth

“Waste not want not” is an old proverb, a drop of conventional wisdom that occurs to me frequently when I am dealing with food. I often see the catchy phrase used to promote recycling programs. While I’m an avid recycler, I more typically try to avoid the waste in the first place. As I’ve said [...]

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Summer Squash, Chard and Leek Tian

The hot, humid, seemingly unbearable cloud of oppressive summer weather makes us seek simple and light vegetarian dishes that use seasonal produce and minimize effort.  Mostly, there are fruits, salads and chilled foods on our table these days but other than grilling, an occasional simple baked dish seems just right.  I have a penchant for [...]

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Zucchini and Noodles in Green Curry Sauce with Thai Basil

Long strands of yellow and green zucchini lighten up a pasta dish, whether combined with spaghetti seasoned with lemon juice and zest, or here, served in a delicious, spicy and creamy Thai–inspired coconut milk sauce with green curry and Thai basil. The strands are also good as a salad lightly dressed with olive oil and [...]

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Roly Poly Zucchini Baked with Vegetable and Basil Filling

Those chubby, spherical summer squash called Roly Poly can be simply sliced and steamed when they’re small, but when they get to be about three and a half or four inches in diameter, they make great containers to fill and bake. I cut them in half through the stem end and use a grapefruit knife [...]

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Spring Zucchini Salad: First Harvest, Simply Served

The cross section of the first zucchini from my garden reveals a pattern of its life: nascent seeds on graceful branches, translucent flesh gradually tinged green inward from the shining green orb. Lovely and fresh.  I’m having a good time watching the summer squash grow: male flowers tall on thin stems, female flowers nurturing their [...]

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Spring Vegetable Lasagna

Light and fresh are not typical descriptors of lasagna, but made with strips of oven-roasted zucchini, ricotta seasoned with spinach and arugula, a few fresh tomatoes reduced with red peppers, and local raw milk mozzarella, this dish was decidedly spring-like.  Since the zucchini was young and a little floppy, I added a single sheet of [...]

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Potato, Zucchini and Red Pepper Gratin

When the humidity drops and the nights become cool, late summer gratins seem like the perfect transition to fall cuisine. I am not ready for the creams and cheeses of the gratins of late fall and winter, but it does feel good to have a warm and homey dish that is still redolent of summer.  [...]

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Zucchini Lemongrass Pancakes with Fresh Peach Salsa

Late summer suppers draw from the wonderful farm produce that still abounds. Since this is Labor Day weekend here in the U.S., which signals the transition into fall, I wanted to celebrate the fruits and vegetables of summer. So when Asa from Miss Meister’s Mat announced the four Paper Chef 56 ingredients – capers, peaches, [...]

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