Had Hubbard Squash blossoms today stuffed with ricotta and parmesan cheese, dipped in batter, and fried. Also snacked on our home-grown sunflower seeds.

Made 3 small batches of refrigerator dill pickles, my husband is crazy about them, which is why I planted cukes. Need more plants next year.
Made pesto from the basil.
Nothing else has come in yet just waiting.

I made four quarts of pesto, currently in individual one cup plastic containers in the freezer. Last weekend we had sautéed okra. Before that we had shrimp sautéed with the last of the tomatoes. Okra is still producing a little more than a pound per week so looks like I will have a good supply in the freezer for gumbo this fall. Basil pots bounced back from hard cropping so I have to think of some different things for it. I already have bunches of it and sage drying in a corner of the kitchen.

Tonight we had a black bean salad with onions, hot and sweet peppers, basil, parsley, tomatoes and spring onions. Made a simple dressing to go on it.
Also roasted zucchini, onion, carrots, cabbage and peppers.
I am really enjoying our little harvests right now.
kim

One of my favorites this time of year is a stew of onions, green beans, peppers, squash, and a bunch of tomatoes cooked in at the end with garlic and basil. I have it over rice and maybe a little grated parmesan.

I have everything I need for Greek salad: cucumbers, tomato, green pepper, red onion, oregano. But it's too cold!

BLT! Had to use store lettuce, though. Still delicious. I've also made my first fresh tomato sauce, basil vinegar, and garlic powder from the heads that were affected by onion maggot. Let me clarify, from the remaining good cloves in those heads... Yow. Today I will be preparing excess cherry tomatoes for dehydrating, and possibly cooking up some long beans if I find enough out there to add to the ones picked yesterday to make a full side dish. And of course we keep chowing down on grilled oinons and various dishes of potatoes. Love potatoes!

Sliced Eggplant on the grill with sliced grilled tomato on top.

Oh boy-

Salads
Cucumber tomato salads (1 creamy, 1 vinegar based)
Vegetable kabobs with onions, green peppers, eggplant, cherry tomatoes, and squash.
White wine feta pasta sauce with eggplant, green beans, broccoli, squash, and cherry tomatoes.
Caprese salad
Bruscetta
BLTs with fresh big beefs from the garden
Broccoli cheddar soup
Cucumber sesame noodle salad
Pesto
Thai basil pesto
Mojitos (well, that's just the mint :) )
Steamed carrots and parsnips
Mashed turnips
New potatoes boiled and tossed with butter, parsley, garlic, and salt.
I'm pretty sure I'm missing some :)

Had a sandwich today made with leftover chicken topped with garden fresh tomatoes and banana peppers with a side of zucchini pickles.

My weekly stir fries are getting a good amount of my never ending harvests of yellow squash, zucchini, chard, kale, and peppers.

3 days ago, I made 3 gallons of my six chile salsa.

The cukes, red onions, and more tomatoes are supplementing my salads.

!st harvest of cantaloupes ever during the last 2 weeks... exquisite all alone.

Kevin

We're still waiting for the first ripe tomato (and peppers will be a while too though I've got a few tiny pods and most plants are flowering). Not just me, the neighbor on the ridge who planted back at Mother's Day (and almost lost her plants to frost) has 1 she says is just starting to turn. I don't know if my aunt 1/2 mile up the road who bought 2ft tall plants at Mother's Day sale, left them outside in frost a couple days later followed by 90-degree heat in June, and finally transplanted them late June has any - she did have some grape tomatoes that looked like they were almost ready mid-July. DH says I baby mine too much trying to harden them off.

Had a big pile of shishitos the other day so I grilled them until blistered and slightly charred, tossed with sea salt, olive oil and lemon juice. Fantastic! I'll be growing these forever.

Here is a link that might be useful: Grilled Shishitos - The Square Foot Gardener Blog

Yummmmm today I am making more zucchini pickles. They are divine.

Tomato sauce; chili sauce; fresh tomato salsa.
Greek green beans.
Yellow squash casserole.
Dill pickles, bread & butter pickles, pickled green & yellow beans, pickled pepperoncini, pickled banana peppers.

Yum!

CUCUMBER RECIPES:

Tzatziki:
16 oz. carton sour cream
1 medium cucumber - pulp and seed removed. Grate flesh in a food processor - coarse grate. Drain cucumber in a mesh sieve pressing out as much water as possible.
1 garlic clove, minced
1 Tablespoon white vinegar
2 Tablespoons olive oil
Salt and Pepper to taste.
Combine all ingredients and refrigerate for at least two hours. Use on sandwiches or as a side condiment.

Cucumber Bread (use cucumber in place of zucchini. I just made some today!):
http://southernfood.about.com/od/zucchinibread/r/bl00819g.htm

Made a delicious chicken and biscuit dish which included my carrots and potatoes. Will be making buttered cooked green beans from the garden too. So cool :). I just love gardening.

Yesterday I made a from scratch spaghetti sauce with a bunch of my early girls, the last of my broccoli, some carrots, onions, eggplant, squash... all from the garden :)

Today I made "Gazpacho on Fire"-- gazpacho made with veggies you first grill. Yum

Here is a link that might be useful: Gazpacho on fire

Mark Bittman's Unstuffed Cabbage (basically an extremely simple and delicious play on stuffed cabbage.) Also his stir fried cabbage with ground pork. Served it with sweet and sour cukes.

Goat cheese tart topped with sauteed summer squash, zucchini, green beans and tomatoes. (Not my tomatoes though - they're still green)

Tonight: Orzo with summer squash, hazelnuts and grilled shrimp.

Every night - salads with lots of types of lettuce, mizuna, endive, cress and, often roasted beets and goat cheese.

Soon - golden beet soup - I got the recipe from the harvest forum here last year. It is delicious.

In the past week:
Golden tomato sauce (from yellow brandywines)
Roasted kohlrabi with cipollini onions
Cucumber salad and tzatziki sauce
Fried eggplant
Coleslaw

Tomatoes, yellow squash and eggplant done ratatouille style.

Salads from lettuce, grn onions, apples, nuts, potatoes - etc.

Three batches of Skeeter's Pea wine from an over-producing lime tree, two batches of plum wine, one batch of apple wine.

Berries, mandarin oranges, lemons, limes in fruit compotes, apple juice canned, nectarine shortcakes. Carrot, celery, peas in chicken pot pies.

Broccoli and cauliflower casseroles.

Can't remember the rest.

Fun, fun, fun.

bejay

Had some green beans the other night (just enough for 2 people) picked more today. Cukes coming in, we've been eating cuke salad with vinegar (need to get some sour cream!), started 1/2 gal and 1 qt of dills fermenting today, only picked 3 cornichon (and 1 got big on me) so not sure what I'm doing with those. Making zucchini preserves from Joy of Jams (not canning, going to go in fridge) tomorrow, squash is macerating right now.

Today I made basil tomato soup using ingredients all from the garden, tomatoes, basil,garlic, and onion. It was absolutely to die for.

Harvested about 12 cups of basil yesterday and made pesto with raw pistachios instead of pine nuts - love it. Roasted some early harvest yukon golds on the grill and tossed them in a little of the pesto.

They were my first potato harvest ever - so very special to me.

Oh, there's nothing like "new" YG straight from the garden. I was digging mine in early July last year (put in Mother's Day). Got late blight later on, so I didn't grow potatoes this year, put beans in that row, but I'm going to have to prep some space for potatoes next year b/c they are SO GOOD!

DD ate 1 green bean last night w/o gagging - yeah! I had picked about 3/4 lb, DS and I ate about half of them, DH is on business trip but he can have the rest Wed night while I'm at market (any I pick tomorrow will go to market - hope it's more than 1 lb, nothing is producing like it was last year, when I'd pick 5-6 lbs off half as many plants!).

Making blueberry buckle this morning at local ice cream shop (commercial kitchen) - they're going to be making a couple of tubs of ice cream to feature our berries. Late in the season, berries are almost over, but it's cheap advertising (and a quart of berries will go farther than if I gave out samples, plus I don't have to buy a "temporary food service" permit)!

Made 15 pints of relish last week with green tomatoes (tomato harvest done and plants pulled. replanted in late beans and peas), Granny Smith Apples, Onions, green bell peppers, vinegar, sugar, and spices. Some kind of yummy!

Tonight was chicken thighs marinated in soy sauce, mixed garden herbs (sage, lemon thyme, lemon verbena, basil, parsley), garden garlic, honey, and homemade basil vinegar and homemade hotsauce then grilled. As the starch/veg was corn chowder with homegrown corn, onions, potatoes and jalepeno. Best time of year!

Meanwhile I am processing many pounds of tomatoes into sauce and "sun" dried tomatoes.

I only have herbs, 25 pepper plants, and had an early crop of sugar snap peas.

I had sautéed sugar snap peas cooked in peanut oil in May. Lately I've been enjoying big batches of padron peppers fried in peanut oil and butter - my favorite, hot and sweet banana peppers fried with onions for fajitas, jalapeno poppers with various experimental fillings, and pesto made with pecans instead of pine nuts. Looking forward to other varieties of peppers to start producing and about to start fall plantings of spinach and sugar snap peas.

Have made all the cats happy with vast quantities of homegrown catnip. :)

This post was edited by bjdurham on Wed, Aug 7, 13 at 20:28

Butterball taters, zuke, crookneck, and coriander seed from garden, fried with tumeric, cumin seed, garlic and onions and chicken -- marinated first in the spices. Delish!

Tomorrow's plan: squash blossoms stuffed with fresh mozzerella and sharp cheddar, dipped in egg and ground hazelnuts. I just need an egg... maybe oil would work :).

Just picked the first ripe tomato today. BLT mania started At 6:30 p.m. And should carry thru to breakfast in the morning. Is it proper to have a BLT before coffee?

Just picked the first ripe tomato today. BLT mania started At 6:30 p.m. And should carry thru to breakfast in the morning. Is it proper to have a BLT before coffee?

sorry, old age, I repeat myself sometimes

This post was edited by myluck on Wed, Aug 7, 13 at 0:28

I just picked dinner: Pasta with leeks and sausage and a big salad.

That makes such a pretty picture.

I got this and the above vegies from a library cookbook, Modern Spice. Is Indian food. I have now ordered a copy!

-

Take 6-8 figs and cut them in quarters. Or be fancy and leave the 4 quarters attached at the flower end, and splay them out. Lay them on a baking tray.

Put them in oven (or toaster oven for energy efficiency).

Hot. 500 degrees is good. Roast till caramelized, 10-20 minutes or so.

Mix 2T coconut, 1/2t cinnamon, and 1/4t cloves.

Put 2 figs in a bowl with couple T plain yogurt, sprinkle with some spice mix, drizzle on some honey (or I used turbinado sugar. You could use anything. Blackberry syrup.)

Omg is fantabulous!

2-bean salad with limas and green beans. When the yellow beans start bearing, I can make 3-bean salad.

We tried a new-to-us variety of summer squash; not sure what it really is, Henry Fields just calls it Dinosaur Eggs (it's round); we sliced it about 1/2" thick, brushed it with olive oil and put it on the grill. Heaven on a plate!
We've had a couple of nice pot-fulls of green beans with new potatoes from DH's aunt's garden. I could just live on fresh green beans!
Cooked some cabbage and turnips with smoked sausage the other night, and that was yummy too!
Got one Mortgage Lifter just about ripe so tomorrow night is BLT night. Can't wait!

Good eating to all!!

Edie

Made some fresh salsa verde with tomatillos, onion, cilantro and jalapeno, all from the garden.

Also made some palak paneer using kale, which turned out really well - the best Indian food I have ever made.

I'm always looking for a good kale recipe - do you mind sharing?

We just Love this easy tomato sauce.

Yum!

Here is a link that might be useful: Marcella Hazen's Tomato Sauce

Oh, we just had a yummy side dish tonight... I sliced a Magda squash and several smaller tomatoes about 1/2" thick, and dipped each slice in a mix of panko crumbs and grated cheese (a mix of Italian types) along with some chopped fresh herbs, then layered the squash and tomato slices in a baking dish. 350 degrees for about an hour. Try it, yiu'll like it!!

Soup:

coconut milk
chicken broth (I made homemade, but the OG in box is good too)
lots of fresh thyme
garlic
onion (fried till golden)
a few baby carrots
zucchini or similar, lots, sliced
salt and pepper

That's all, but it's lovely! Ate it tonight with some homemade pesto, and a piece of cold fried chicken :). Tomorrow we'll try it with some bits of bacon on top instead.

I love this thread, so I bump it :).

Today:

Herb pie, with substitutions to fit my current produce:

I increased the feta because I always do -- I love feta!
Magda squash + kale instead of chard, because I had them.
Fresh za'atar instead of dill, same reason. (I put less than I would of dill, but is still a bit much)
Side of baby taters instead of filo.

Is pretty darn good with some fresh tomatoes :).

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/mar/20/herb-pie-recipe-vegetarian-ottolenghi

Besides more grilled squash and green beans, we've had edamame and the first ripe (Latah) tomatoes, thrown with green beans, sliced baby carrots and frozen corn into a cold salad with olive oil, Ponzu sauce, lime juice, salt and pepper (wish I had cilantro but it bolted). Oh, and I've been making bread and butter pickles (almost ready to taste) and half sours (had one Sat, those are good!).

Tonight I made a pasta sauce with caramelized onions, bacon, turkish orange eggplant, tomatoes and basil. It hit the spot but since I also cut up 6 lb of carrots to blanche and freeze and 4 lb of onions to caramelize in the crockpot, I am thinking tomorrow's dinner will not involve a knife.

O man. All the colorful tasty staff I see here.
I am also making something with yellow zuke. There are many ways, stir fry, grill, deep fry, etc.
But this time I am making a "stuffed" one.
I cut a lid lengthwise, scoop most of the inner contents out, fry it with onions, garlic, paprika, pepper, salt, sausage ... until volume is reduced.I usually make with chicken breast but this time I had sausage handy.
Then stuff it back into the zuke, put the lid in, secure by twin and bake it at 350F. ..How long ? Untill it is done. lol. Maybe an hour or so. This is differen kind of stuffing, not the traditional wit lots of rice.. and what not

Mmmm, seysonn, that sounds great!

Hmmm, it isn't exactly from the garden but I did grow it myself- roast heritage chicken! Extra fresh and extra good. I did include a fair bit of tarragon from the herb garden inside it and under the skin.

Oh, yummy!

I made the coconut zucchini soup again. So good! and it reminded me of this thread :).