YES, I KNOW: technically, it is not summer. But we’ve got forecasts in the 80s, and darn it, it’s (about to be! Whoo hoo!) Memorial Day weekend. Let the picnicking and ‘cue-ing begin! In need of inspiration? Look no further than our own archives of amazing summer recipes. Some vintage, some our own concoctions, there’s plenty to tempt palates from simple to soignée…

Let’s start with the basics, shall we? We love a good potato salad, and while we can’t make it from our own garden haul, not just yet, that’s no reason not to enjoy this all-American staple. Take a peek at our Ladies’ Auxiliary vintage recipe round-up, and you’ll find something just perfect for your picnic table.

I love fried chicken, but try to do like my disciplined friend Mimi: indulge in it, and indulge good, just once a year. If this isn’t your moment for deep fried decadence, my high school reunion special roast chicken is good hot, warm or cold, and makes a healthier, impossibly easy stand-in.

To continue the healthy theme, check out my Asian-inflected food blog roundup. Among other perfect-for-the-heat suggestions is a divine cold noodle salad from uber-blogger Heidi Swanson. (Want more of the wonders of the digital recipe box? Many more favorite food blogs await you.

But wait! What about dessert? Well, you’ve read my apple pie saga, right? Though not seasonally appropriate, apple pie’s always divine…but then again, in my family, it can cause some serious strife. Maybe best to stick with the season, and let the only fool be rhubarb. Mmmm.

Ok, sisters: your turns. What picnics are you packing, what sides are you serving for this upcoming, eagerly awaited long weekend?

Related posts:

1. Sisters, Root for Rhubarb MAY IS THE month where my garden comes alive, and...

MAY IS THE month where my garden comes alive, and one of the first things I start cooking is rhubarb. So what better time to take a look back, through our treasured cache of Ladies’ Auxiliary cookbooks, to see how our fore-sisters treated this ruby red delight?

I’m all about rhubarb desserts, because I love sweets that aren’t TOO sweet. For me, rhubarb’s silky, soft texture and assertively tart taste are unbeatable when it comes to pies, cakes and crumbles. My cooking sisters seem to agree.

Take the seven sisters who published their own family cookbook, “Then ‘Til Now”, featuring recipes from all seven, plus their mama. Sister Fran (she’s at 8 o’clock in the picture) contributed the book’s only rhubarb receipt, and it couldn’t be simpler – just one dish! (That’s it up above, at the top of this post.)

The Ladies are, mostly, rhubarb purists; the experimental concoctions we see for other ingredients are in short supply for the ruby red stalks. But then – what’s an auxiliary cookbook journey without a spin in the Jello outboard?

Ok, back on planet “I would actually eat that”, we have simple, classic recipes. Rhubarb custard pie? Perfect, exactly as you’d expect from the members of the New Jersey Garden Club. I especially love that it calls for “a lump of butter”. That, friends, is straight from the days when cooks trusted themselves in the kitchen.

And, of course, the ladies are hip to everyone’s favorite rhubarb cohort, strawberries. Though we won’t have those from the garden for a while, they’re worth waiting for, if you can indulge in a special betty. Though I’d use butter instead of margarine, I can’t quibble with this simple recipe.

The only thing I couldn’t find? To my surprise, not a single one of my sweet cookery books featured a recipe for rhubarb jam or conserve, which sounds awfully appealing to me. Have any of you sisters got one from your own culinary archives to share?

And on another note, be sure to watch for my own take on rhubarb, over at my new gig for OnEarth magazine – a once-a-week look at my gardening (mis)adventures.

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AFTER A HOLIDAY season of massive indulgence, the new year brought a new resolve: I’ve gone sugar-free (at least, mostly). And I’m coping surprisingly well without my nightly chocolate fix (thanks for asking). But I’ve found some great resources to help. Want to join me in my pursuit of a healthier sweet life? Read on.

I think it was the caramels that did me in. I made batch after batch as holiday gifts this year; a couple failed and were crushed into toffee bits for Christmas cookies, and then, insane circumstances forced me out of town, holiday gifts (for teachers at school) undelivered. I had 8 dozen spare caramels and about as many toffee cookies on hand. I think I only ate 3 dozen or so. Of each.

Blecch.

By the new year, I felt like a deleted expletive. And, in the serendipitous way that these connections find me, I started seeing people I admire chucking sugar out the window. Online icons like Kris Carr and Shauna Ahern, my inspiring new teacher Brené Brown (read about the class I’m taking with her), other friends in the real world, too, were all extolling the pleasures of a less-refined life (ingredient-wise, anyway).

Sometimes, the right example is all you need to see a shift in yourself. I quit white sugar, at least for a while, with the caveat that once in a while, on a special occasion, I might take a bite of something…but I quickly discovered that my sweet tooth more or less left with the sugar bowl. And after I chucked sugar, it felt pretty easy to abandon white flour, too. So while I’ve tasted a dessert or two at a dinner party in the last month, my sense of missing sugar is gone, and I’ve cut way down on my consumption of, as Oprah says, the “white stuff.”

That said…every once in a while I want to make something special. And if I’m going to bake for my family, I would rather have something I can try without feeling guilty (or unhealthy). So I’ve turned to some great online resources for advice and inspiration. Some of these will be familiar to you if you’ve been reading for a while, but others are all new. In no particular order:

1. Alana of Eating From the Ground Up

Alana is one of my favorite people in the real world AND online. She’s not all about sugar-free, but she is about simple, clean and healthy. She gets top billing because I was privileged to try her amazing sugar-free birthday cake last year. It was heavenly; all the kids and adults devoured it, and the absence of sugar? You could never have guessed. My next goal: to try to adapt it to a gluten-free, whole grain version.

2. Shauna of Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef

I’m lucky enough to call Shauna Ahern a friend, too, and it was her Facebook announcement that she was done with white sugar that crystallized my own resolve. She’s expanding her baking repertoire to include unrefined sweeteners, and I’m dying to try her new whole grain muffin recipe. My favorite muffin of all time is a lemon walnut amazement baked at the (superb, sugar-full) Sweet Lady Jane bakery in L.A. I’m going to see if I can make a healthful version that does justice to my nostalgia. (And if you’ve never read it, our profile of Shauna shows a whole other side of this food blogger extraordinaire. We love her!)

3. Elana of Elana’s Pantry

Elana was one of our early discoveries, and we love her energy and creativity about, well, just about everything. Super healthy, Elana is nevertheless dedicated to preserving her fair share of culinary hedonism; she’s not above chocolate chips in her brownies. But she uses alternative sweeteners and simple recipes to preserve nutrients and minimize processed ingredients. Her raspberry hamantaschen are calling my name.

4. Amy of Simply Sugar and Gluten-Free

Amy Green turned to sugar- and gluten-free cooking as a way to control a lifelong struggle with her weight. Now, she says, she keeps off the 60 pounds she lost by sticking to this cleaner way of eating. Clean eating that includes almond butter blondies sounds pretty good to me…

5. Isa Chandra of Post Punk Kitchen

Ok, Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s site is all about veganism, not going sugar-free, but it’s got a lot of sugar-free-friendly recipes, like oatmeal peanut butter cookies. And Isa’s got great tats. Tats, people. Though I am uninked, I have a not-so-secret love of tattoos, and how can you not love a woman with a beautiful matryoshka on her arm?

6. The fine folks at Truvia

Ok, it’s not a blog, it’s a totally commercial site, and the parent company is agro-giant Cargill, which gives me shivers. But I’ve been a fan of stevia for years (I was turned onto it by, of all people, Larry Hagman and Linda Gray. Yes, of Dallas. In a very strange meeting which also included Dennis Weaver. Yes, McCloud. Another story from another lifetime.) I even tried to sell a magazine article about this super sweet, super healthy herb before it went mainstream. But cooking with it never worked for me, so I’m eager to see if the professional chefs working for this company have figured it out. They’ve got loads of sweet and savory recipes, including a tempting apple berry galette. They’ve even enlisted Top Chef hunk Sam Talbot to develop recipes for them. Eye candy, anyone?

7. Heidi of 101 Cookbooks

Heidi Swanson is another foodie blogosphere rock star, and for good reason. Her recipes are thoughtful, beautifully presented, and they work. So when she offers up a sugarless carrot cake, resistance is definitely futile, and probably stupid.Her site is chock full of low and no sugar recipes, and inspiration for many more.

I know there are more than this out there. Have any of you been inspired to make similar dietary changes? I’d love to hear your stories, and your recipes!

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ALL GOOD THINGS must come to an end. It’s a cliché for a reason. True of this year’s bounteous harvest, and of our ongoing blog-fest cooking marathon. But with the ultimate foodie holiday on the horizon, I’ve got some good things to give thanks for, and to share.

When your life turns upside down, either by choice or by force, it can take a long time, years even, to see what’s been transformed, and what’s remained the same. When my family and I left Los Angeles nearly four years ago for our now-not-so-new home in the (very) rural Hudson Valley, we were able to anticipate a lot of the changes. But one I didn’t foresee was that my Thanksgiving traditions, ones I’d held to perhaps a little too tightly, would fall away without my even noticing.

You see, my children had to remind me last week that yes, in fact, this Thanksgiving would be the very first one we’d spend dining, myself at the culinary helm, in our now-not-so-new house. After years of hanging on like a solo mariner in a gale, I’d let go of the lines. Not one but three different sets of friends have hosted us over these last few years. I helped, I brought, I ate, but every time,  I was decidedly not in control of anything from menu to table setting to guest list. And guess what? I survived. (Should we take it personally that none of them have invited us back? God, I hope not.)

This year, I’m back in charge, at least nominally. The turkey, from a new and dear friend’s farm, is in the fridge. I’ll be hunting for local sweet potatoes today, and hitting my favorite bakery for bread for stuffing, too. I haven’t yet figured out exactly what’s going in my turkey brine, nor which stuffing recipe I’ll use. (For years, and years and YEARS: I sent invitations. In the MAIL. I made and remade guest lists. And my menu? It never varied. Not a whit.)

Is it better this way, loose and a little serendipitous? Yes, and no. Is it different? Yes, and no. But we’ve found our way through all the changes to a place that suits us. I’m as excited as ever for my feast, but a lot more relaxed about what the day will bring. It’s a nice metaphor, really, for the pace of rural life, where you are constantly butting up against the unexpected, the inconvenient, and the just plain absurd, most attributable to natural, not human, capriciousness.

So this year, I’ll raise a glass to the unexpected, and a newfound ability to embrace its gifts as well as its challenges. What better way to appreciate the bounty that feeds us?

(Need more substantial Thanksgiving guidance? Be sure to check out some of my favorite Thanksgiving recipes here, here and here. Need to relax? Check out our best-ever picks for Thanksgiving movies. And whatever you do, be sure to visit my fellow Fall Fest bloggers for this last week of goodness.)

Alana of Eating from the Ground Up on Turkeys and Apple

Caron of San Diego Foodstuff : Bounty to Be Grateful For in the Form of Community (And Pecan Pie.)

Liz and the crew at the Food Network on Thanksgiving Bounty We’re Grateful For.

Jennifer at The Gilded Fork on gratitude.

Caroline at The Wright Recipe on Butternut Squash Biscuits.

Tara at Teas and Cookies on surprisingly wonderful stuffed pumpkin.

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THOUGH I AM happy as a clam, or, more aptly, I suppose, a cow, in the rural world I now call home, somehow, my culinary self remains under the gravitational pull of Los Angeles.

Last week, I wrote about making dinner for a kinda famous foodie: to ease my anxiety, I turned to my comfort cuisine, always Mexican. This week, when I started thinking salads, I felt the nostalgia rising in me. Los Angeles, for reasons I don’t pretend to understand, is the unofficial world capital of the chopped salad. And they’re not all Cobbs, either, though I love those. No, there are Italian versions, Asian ones, and the superbly elegant salads made my very-French friend, chef Jean-Francois Méteigner. (Just buy his book. You won’t regret it.)

And then there’s the one that I make, one I learned in a magical evening cooking class I took more than six years ago. It was a birthday party for my sister-in-the-kitchen Chris; the night will stay in each of our memories for reasons of sisterhood way more than food. But the food was delicious, all created by a French-trained, Stanford-educated, handsome and cool chef who blew us all away with his effortless ease in the kitchen, and his fantastic way with combining flavors. (Did I mention he was handsome? He tells me he’s moving to San Francisco; you can keep up with the lovely Chef Tim by following him on Twitter.)

In the years since the class, more than once I have called Chris in a panic. “I can’t find the recipe sheets from Tim’s class! I need that spinach salad!” And Chris, three times now (bless her) has faxed those sheets to me. (I finally found my own carefully-preserved copy, just this year.)

This is a chopped salad. It’s also a finger food. I’ve never had anything quite like it. And it’s one of the most delicious, most praised hors d’ouevres I ever, ever serve. Thanks to Tim, thanks to Chris, it takes me back to a perfect Silverlake summer night, but it’s appropriate and appreciated any time of year.

Spinach, Onion Marmalade, Walnuts and Feta in Endive Leaves
adapted from Tim Ross
makes at least 4 dozen hors d’ouevres

10 ounces baby spinach (non-baby is fine, too, but if the stems are tough, pull them off and discard them)
8 endives, separated into individual leaves
1 5 oz package feta (I like sheep’s milk), rinsed and patted dry with a paper towel; cut into 1/4 inch dice or crumbled into pieces roughly that size
1 cup walnuts, toasted in a sauté pan and roughly chopped

Onion Marmalade:
4 cups finely chopped Vidalia or other sweet onion
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

First, make the marmalade:
Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat until shimmering. Add the onion, salt, pepper and cayenne and cook, stirring often, for 10 to 15 minutes, or until the onions are golden. Add the sugar and cook for 2 minutes more, stirring constantly. Add the vinegar and cook for one more minute. Remove from heat, and cool. This can be stored in an airtight container for up to a week, and leftovers are delicious as a condiment served with cheese.

To make the salad:

Finely chop the spinach. This takes patience. Do it in batches. The goal is a nice, thin juliene. Toss the slivered spinach with the marmalade to coat, and stir in the walnuts and cheese. Place a scant tablespoon (or so–the actual amount will vary according to the fineness of the salad’s chop, the size of your endive leaves, and the phase of the moon) of salad on the end of each endive leaf (the root end, not the top) and serve chilled or at room temperature. These look beautiful arrayed in concentric circles on a round platter.

See what’s cooking on the other Fall Fest blogs!

• Gilded Fork: Red & White Salad with Candied Pecans, Figs & Chevre
• Margaret at A Way to Garden: Why Beets Make the Salad
• Caroline at the Wright Recipes: Salt-Roasted Beet and Potato Salad
• Michelle at Cooking Channel: 5 Fab Fall Salads
• Liz at Healthy Eats: 5 Favorite Fall Salads
• Alison at Food2: Fall Salads, Deconstructed
• Alana at Eating From the Ground Up: Kale Salad
• Todd and Diane at White on Rice Couple: Arugula, Bacon and Fig Salad
• Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Wheat Berry Salad with Apples and Pomegranate Seeds
• Nicole at Pinch My Salt: Spinach Pomegranate Salad with Apples and Walnuts
• Cate at Sweetnicks: Bleu Cheese and Walnut Salad with Maple Dressing

No related posts.

Shauna, Danny and Lu, photographed by Todd Porter and Diane Cu of White on Rice Couple

WE ALL SAY it so often it’s become a cliché: this online world of ours, it really is its own community, maybe even a family, a sisterhood. We admired the Gluten Free Girl from afar; then we profiled her here; and now, we are thrilled to say, we have become IRL (that’s “in real life”) friends, too. Read on for all the delicious details of our very own dinner with Shauna (and Dan and Lu, too.)

Shauna emailed a few months back to say she, Dan and Lu would be heading east for their new book, Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef: could she swing north from NYC and visit me and Margaret at our crazy homes in the sticks? Uh–YES, please! Plans were made, transportation arranged, and last Friday, the Aherns arrived for dinner. That’s right, dear readers, I had to cook for one of the most popular food bloggers, oh, on the planet (just ask the London Times, or Gourmet, or Bon Appetit.)

Of course I was quick to order the book, and wasn’t disappointed: it’s a lovely memoir-cookbook combination, with recipes that range from simple comfort fare (their favorite meatloaf) to more “cheffy” stuff, like Poussin with Red Quinoa and Rhubarb (which I am dying to try.)  I’ve just started cooking through the book, and I highly recommend the Roasted Chicken Roulade with Goat Cheese and Arugula. But I didn’t want to cook dishes from the book for our dinner with them. What if I flubbed them? Were they sick of those recipes? (Probably not. But what if I flubbed them?)

What to make when you’re cooking for a crew, and slightly nervous to boot? Something well within your comfort zone. And, if you can draft a friend to help out and keep you company, even better. My dear friend Alana, of Eating from the Ground Up, agreed to join me, and I planned my favorite comfort food–specifically, a rustic Mexican feast. Guacamole, salsa made with tomatillos from my garden, herby green rice, black beans, and sumptuous carnitas: pork butt spiced, braised and roasted until it is falling-apart tender, succulent and crisp, all at the same time. Alana suggested homemade corn tortillas, and brought along two fantastic red salsas, one fresh, the other roasted. Dessert? Dense chocolate walnut cookies (gluten free, of course) and local ice cream.

We all forgot to get our cameras! Luckily, Dan had his phone.

The food was delicious, I am happy to say. But the company was even better, as we all laughed and talked together: internet lives, rural lives, cooking lives…things we all share. And in the spirit of sharing, here’s the how-to for the carnitas that fed our crowd (and, to my great joy, prompted praise from our guests.) I hope you’ll enjoy them as much as we did. Come to think of it, if you’re making ‘em, invite us to dinner, too!

Carnitas for a Crowd
adapted from David Liebowitz
Serves at least 12–with leftovers

10 lbs pork butt (Ask the butcher to leave the bone in, but cut the meat into large chunks. And I do mean large! Mine were 5 inches across and 2-3 inches thick.)
1 Tablespoon coarse sea salt
1 Tablespoon Bourbon Smoked Sea Salt* (This works very well, but feel free to use an additional tablespoon of the coarse sea salt, instead.)
2 Tablespoons canola or neutral vegetable oil
1/2 cup cider vinegar
water
2 cinnamon sticks
2 teaspoons chile powder
2 teaspoons ancho chile powder (you will probably have to buy a whole dried ancho chile, and grind it yourself in a coffee grinder or spice mill)
2 bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
6 cloves of garlic, peeled and thinly-sliced

1. Rub the pieces of pork shoulder all over with both salts. Refrigerate for 1- to 3-days. (You can skip this step if you want. Just be sure to salt the pork before searing the meat in the next step.)

2. Heat the oil in a roasting pan set on the stovetop. Cook the pieces of pork shoulder in a single layer over medium high heat until very well-browned on all sides. (Let one side brown until it releases from the pan, then turn to the next side, and so on.) If your pan is too small to cook them in a single layer, do them in two batches.

3. Once all the pork is browned, remove from the pan and blot away any excess fat with a paper towel, then pour in the cider vinegar and about half a cup of water, scraping the bottom of the pan with a flat-edged utensil to release all the tasty brown bits.

4. Heat the oven to 350F degrees.

5. Add the pork back to the pan and add enough water so the pork pieces are 2/3rd’s submerged in liquid. Add the cinnamon stick and sprinkle in the chile powders, bay leaves, cumin and garlic, trying your best to spread them evenly around the pan.

7. Braise in the oven uncovered for 3½ hours, turning the pork a few times during cooking, until the pork is falling apart. Remove the pan from the oven and lift the pork pieces out of the liquid. Cover both the meat and liquid, and cool to room temperature.

8. Remove the meat from the bones and chop coarsely (1/2 to 3/4 inch chunks are best.) Pour the liquid remaining in the pan into a heatproof container, and refrigerate until the fat solidifies on the top. (You can cheat and put it in the freezer, as long as you wait until the liquid comes to room temperature first.)Refrigerate the meat too if you are not planning to serve it immediately.

9. When you are ready to serve, preheat the oven to 350. Return the meat to the pan, and pour the defatted juices over. Cover loosely with foil, and place in the oven to reheat for about 20 minutes (more is fine as long as you check the meat to make sure it’s not drying out–you should have plenty of liquid, so this is unlikely to be a problem, and you want some crisp bits on top: the dual texture of the meat is one of the joys of the dish.

*I was given the Bourbon Barrel Sea Salt by the producer, Bourbon Barrel Foods.

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IT’S HAPPENED TO us all, we cooks: a great recipe book somehow goes sadly, horribly wrong. I was thrilled a couple of  weeks ago when I opened a package to find a cookbook I’d finally ordered for myself, one I’d seen gourmands praising for years as a superior resource for a particular regional cuisine. “Perfect!” thought I. “This will let me do something really unexpected for Summer-isn’t it fall-yet?? Fest”

Be careful of exacting plans. I found a recipe that featured potatoes, in combination with other veggies I love. It even contained legumes, making for a savory, vegetarian main dish. This was exactly what I was craving, as it happened, with leaves starting to blow off trees and a bite in the morning air. I followed the recipe to the letter. And you know what?

It was glop. Boring, banal and bland, with a side of not-very-appetizing-to-look-at. Furious at wasting my precious crop of home grown potatoes, I shoved the remaining tubers back into their dark storage, and began to brood on cooking disappointments I have known. And…on what the hell I was going to say to you people about potatoes, for after this culinary disaster, what with the chaos of back to school and work and life..my kitchen mojo was flagging. Badly.

I am sorry to say, I still haven’t recovered much of a will to cook. In my house, right now, we’re off of fancy food. Dinner tonight is an experiment in slow cooking, and tomorrow, though a friend is coming by, I’m serving…burgers. He’s married to a fabulous foodie, but bless him, he’d mostly rather eat a hamburger, and so that’s what we’re having.

Alongside, though, I’ll serve french fries, damn it, and use some more of the gorgeous potatoes I managed to coax out of my garden. French fries are all method, not recipe, but the one I use is from my beloved Gourmet. I recommend it not only because it works, but because the spice-and-salt formula included in the recipe is a (better) version of Lawry’s, not to mention a dead ringer for the stuff used on the Ollie’s Trolley burgers I loved as a child, the best I remember eating, ever. Maybe a dose of nostalgia, not to mention meat and potatoes, will cure what ails me this week in the kitchen.

SUMMER FEST IS A cross-blog recipe (and tip) swap–and you’re invited to participate. Simply post your link or recipe or idea in the comments below my post, and also on the blogs of the other participants listed here. Want more information? Get the details (and the schedule for upcoming weeks). My collaborators’ goodies:

Alison at Food2: Boil ‘Em, Mash ‘Em, Stick ‘Em in a Stew
Kirsten at FN Dish: Twice-Baked Potatoes
Sara at Cooking Channel: Duck Fat Roasted Potatoes
Liz at Healthy Eats: A Day of Potatoes: Spuds for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
Nicole at Pinch My Salt: Potato Taquitos, made with leftover mashed potatoes
Caroline at the Wright Recipes: Indian Spiced Potatoes with Chickpeas (Aloo Chole)
Cate at Sweetnicks: Bleu Cheese Potato Mashers
Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Hatch Chile Potato Salad
Alana at Eating From the Ground Up: The strange experience of growing potatoes
Margaret at A Way to Garden: Potato Growing, Curing and Storage Tips

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ONLY WHEN I sat down to contemplate this week’s Summer Fest assignment did I face up to this paradoxical truth: I put garlic in just about everything I make, and I am also a garlic avoider.

My pesto? Generally garlic-free. Garlic bread? Tasty, but I’d rather dip into plain (excellent) olive oil any day. I love the vinaigrette my friend makes, heady with chopped garlic, but I never add it to my own version. That said, pretty much any stew, soup, sauté or braise I make is loaded with carefully (and sometimes not so carefully) minced cloves. So garlic is an important note, but not, it turns out, one I like to bring to the fore. Some of this is tragic biology: when I eat raw garlic, it takes forever for me to stop feeling like I’ve got eau de garlic coming out of every pore. But it’s also about balancing flavors: I like garlic best when its bite is underlining other tastes. Which makes it darn hard to pick a recipe that features garlic.

And then, as I was contemplating the pile of zucchini that (yes, still) overwhelms my fridge, I realized what I eat, all summer long (and, it turns out, fall too) that is all about garlic. All about garlic, that is, married to the sweet, sometimes astringent flavor of zucchini, producing a combination that, to me, is way, way more than the sum of its humble parts.

Spaghetti with Garlic and Zucchini
Serves 4

1 lb. dried spaghetti
2 T olive oil
6-8 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2-3 medium zucchini, julienned on a mandoline
1 t kosher salt
1/8 t pepperoncini or other crumbled dried chile
freshly grated parmesan cheese, the best you can find and afford–quality makes a huge difference

Place the julienned zucchini in a colander in the sink, and sprinkle with the salt. Allow to drain for 20 minutes or so, then rinse, and finally squeeze out as much water as you can without breaking down the zucchini slivers.

Meanwhile, bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil and add pasta. Cook al dente, according to package directions and/or your taste.

While the pasta cooks, heat a sauté pan over medium heat and add the chopped garlic. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the garlic is aromatic, golden and softening, but preferably not brown and crispy. Add the zucchini, and sauté until just cooked through. If it browns slightly, that’s fine, but your goal is lovely bright green strands to intermingle with your pasta.

Drain the spaghetti and add as much as you can to your sauté pan (if it won’t all fit, that’s ok–you can mix more in to each bowl as you serve, if you need to) and toss to combine with the zucchini. Sprinkle with the pepperoncini, to taste.

Serve immediately with as much freshly grated parmesan as you desire.

SUMMER FEST IS A cross-blog recipe (and tip) swap–and you’re invited to participate. Simply post your link or recipe or idea in the comments below my post, and also on the blogs of the other participants listed here. Want more information? Get the details (and the schedule for upcoming weeks). My collaborators’ goodies:

Todd and Diane at White on Rice Couple: Garlic Knots
Nicole at Pinch My Salt: Spicy Pickled Garlic
Sara at Food2: Easiest Recipes Ever, Starring Garlic
Michelle on Cooking Channel: Roasted Garlic
Liz at Healthy Eats: 5 Reasons to Eat More Garlic
Kirsten at FN Dish: Garlic Chicken Greats
Margaret at A Way to Garden: Growing and Storing a Year of Garlic
Caroline at the Wright Recipes: Ajo Blanco Soup, and Confit Garlic
The Gilded Fork: Garlic Dossier and Recipes
Food Network UK: Glorious Garlic
Alana at Eating from the Group Up: Pickled Garlic
Cate at Sweetnicks: Double Dose of Garlic—Cuban Black Beans and The Best Pork Ever
Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Italian Marinated Eggplant and Sorrel and Garlic Sauce

No related posts.

I RETURNED FROM my summer travels with just a bit of dread. Not of unopened mail or calls to be returned: I feared my garden, and rightly.

After only a week away, I found a state of explosion. You can see the results up there: tomatoes of every size and hue, giant mottled heirlooms, tiny red cherries and orange sungolds, some odd yellow plums and giant pastes. I was grateful not to find fruit rotting on the vine, but I did manage to pick a good fifteen pounds in about as many minutes.

The problem with such bounty is that if you’ve got that much ripe at once, you’ve got to use it all. Now. After last summer’s non-starter of a tomato harvest (oh, the heartbreak of pulling all those blighted babies) I cannot bear to let any fruit go unappreciated. Thanks to sister Margaret, I’ve got the religion of tomato junk; I’ve made and frozen a good ten quarts so far. The amazing Dorie Greenspan taught me about slow roasting, and I freeze those babies, too. I make a mean caprese salad for lunch, as though it’s nothing at all, and often, I just slice and eat them, sprinkled with some Maldon salt and a drizzle of great olive oil. This is all so, so, good. But as our wind picks up and the temperature drops (yes, here in the northeast, this is already happening–sob!) I want something more.

I want a dish that uses up some of the other vegetables I have in absurd abundance. Something warm, and nearly, but not quite, hearty. A dish that might be intended as a side, but is so substantial it can hold its own as a main.

In my repertoire, I have three recipes that fit this bill, recipes I return to every summer. One is more or less my creation; the other two are by others, chefs whose work I study and adore. At the risk of excess (hopefully not the wretched kind), I offer three suggestions for non-sauce, non-salad enjoyment of tomatoes: a caramelized onion and tomato tart; a tomato, onion and potato gratin gently adapted from the inimitable Suzanne Goin, and a dead simple, impeccably delicious zucchini, eggplant and tomato gratin from none other than Julia Child and Jacques Pepin. As Julia would say, Bon Appétit!

Onion Tart with Gruyere and Tomato
Serves 4-6

This was inspired by something I adored as a child. When I was four, my father briefly moved us to Blackburn, England, for a short assignment in the local branch of the company he worked for back in Chattanooga (yes, I spent half my childhood in the deep south, but that’s a whole other story.) This part of England at the time–maybe it still is?– was heavily industrialized, not very pretty, but to me, the trip, which lasted a few months, was a grand adventure. We went to Beatrix Potter’s farm, visited London, but the part I really remember is how much I loved the food at the residence hotel (called the White House–really!–where we lived.) And this is when English food was considered boiled to death, unseasoned pap, long before Jamie Oliver, Rose Gray, Nigella Lawson et. al.  I particularly craved their cheese and onion flan, a kind of quiche, but with just enough egg to bind it, and lots of cheese and onions, and their apple pie, served with unmentionably thick Devonshire cream. I used to lick my plate. The fact that I loved the onion flan was apparently of particular amusement to the staff and other guests of the hotel. A few years ago, I concocted this homage to my rarefied childhood tastes.

4  large onions
2 T olive oil
salt
pepper
1 t dried thyme
1 recipe of your favorite dough for a savory tart (I use ‘Rich Tart Dough’ from Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Anything, but omit the sugar; when the dough is done, roll it out and press into a 10 inch tart pan with a removable bottom)
1/2 cup grated gruyere cheese
1 large tomato, sliced thin, seeded, and then sliced again into strips
2 eggs, lightly beaten

Preheat the oven to 375 F.

Slice the onions crosswise and then into very thin slices. You should have 5 or 6 cups of sliced onions. Heat the olive oil in a dutch oven, and then add the onions, cooking over medium heat until they turn a nice golden brown (but don’t let them stick to the bottom of the pan–keep stirring so they stay nice and soft as they brown.) It will take 20 minutes, maybe 30– enough time to make and chill the dough, if you’re making it (see below.) When they’re soft and a nice caramel-y brown, not too dark, remove the pan from the heat.

Put one third of the grated cheese in the bottom of the prepared tart pan. Add the onions, then another layer of cheese. Pour on the eggs, covering the pan evenly. Add the tomatoes, then a final light layer of cheese. Bake for 40-45 minutes, or until both crust and top are golden brown.

You could certainly not make a scratch crust for this; a prepared crust or probably even pizza dough would be good. But if you have a food processor, crust is really easy, and Bittman’s recipe has the advantage of not needing a lot of chilling time (10 minutes in the freezer before you roll it; 20 minutes in the freezer before you bake it) and not needing prebaking. And if you like to cook, or especially if you’re learning, that cookbook is fantastic. Check it out.

Julia and Jacques’ Summer Vegetable Gratin
(adapted from Julia and Jacques Cooking At Home, Knopf, 1999)
Serves 6-8

1/2 c extra virgin olive oil (you may want a bit more or less, according to taste)
1 large or 2 medium eggplants, about 1-1/4 pounds total
1 T herbes de Provence
1 t coarse salt
2 medium zucchini, about 1 pound total
3 or 4 ripe tomatoes, about 1 pound total
1/2 t freshly ground black pepper
1 cup fresh bread crumbs, not too finely ground
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Put the rack in the lower middle level of the oven and preheat to 400F. Smear the baking sheet generously with 1/4 cup of olive oil.

Trim the ends of the eggplant and slice on the diagonal into 1/2 inch thick ovals. Lay the slices on the sheet, press, to coat with the olive oil, and then turn over. Arrange them in a single layer on teh sheet and sprinkle on 1/2 teaspoon each salt and herbes de Provence.

Bake for about 15 minutes, until the eggplant slices are soft and a bit shriveled; allow to cool briefly. Leave the oven on if you will be baking the gratin right away.

Meanwhile, trim the ends off the zucchini and cut lengthwise into slices no more than 1/4 inch thick. Core the tomatoes and cut into slices 1/4 inch thick. Core the tomatoes and cut into slices 1/4 inch thick. Spread out the slices and sprinkle them lightly with 1/2 teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper.

Rub 1 teaspoon olive oil all over an 8 quart gratin or other shallow baking dish. Sprinkle a teaspoon of the herbes de Provence over the bottom of the dish.

Lay one or two eggplant slices, lengthwise, against one narrow end of the dish. Arrange a long slice ortwo of zucchini in front of the eggplant, then place 2 or 3 tomato slices in front of the zucchini. Keep alternating this way to fill the pan, arranging each new row of slices so the colorful edges of the previous row are still visible.

Mix together the bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese and a teaspoon of the herbes de Provence. Add a tablespoon or two of olive oil, then toss and rub it in with your fingers to coat the crumbs but keep them loose. Sprinkle the crumbs evenly over the vegetables and drizzle the rest of the oil over all.

Place the dish in the center of the oven and bake for 40 minutes, until the vegetables are soft, the uices are bubbling and the top is a deep golden brown. Serve hot, directly from the baking dish. (It’s also good cold the next day, though the nice crisp contrast of the breadcrumbs is lost.)

You can make this ahead; just omit the drizzle of olive oil, and cover the prepared gratin tightly with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for up to several hours; just before baking, put the drizzle olive oil on.

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RETURNING READERS MAY remember last summer as the time of pie anxiety. After a cataclysmic conflict over crust, my mother and I foolishly faced off in a local pie contest and, well, let’s just say that neither of us felt like much of a winner by the end. Ever since, I seem to have been avoiding pie entirely, at least in my own kitchen.

My husband, fully aware of both the pie drama and the ensuing Year Of No Pie, was grateful when I came up with my latest favorite dessert. Not quite pie, not quite crumble, it remains nameless, and delicious. It is easy to make, foolproof, crowd pleasing. What more do you need in the waning days of summer?

I still have berries to pick (blackberries are just ripening in my secret patch down by the barn) so I’ve been combining them with peaches. It’s a perfect mix of bright sour flavors with succulent sweetness, but you could use any stone fruit, alone or in combination, with or without berries. (If you still have rhubarb, that’s good, too!) I prefer my desserts on the less-sugary side, but if you warm to a sweeter taste, increase the sugar to suit your fruit, and your liking.

Summer Fruit Whatchamacallit
Serves 8

6 cups mixed stone fruit and/or berries, stone fruit peeled if desired (I never bother) and cut into 1/4-1/2 inch wide slices, according to preference
1/3 cup granulated sugar
grated zest of one orange
1 vanilla bean or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 T cornstarch
1 c unsalted butter, cold, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
3/4 c all purpose flour
1/8 t fine sea salt
3/8 c sugar
1/8 c light brown sugar
1/2 c blanched, slivered almonds

Preheat oven to 375 F.

Toss fruit with sugar, orange zest and corn starch. If using vanilla bean, cut it in half lengthwise and carefully scrape out the tiny black seeds into the bowl of fruit. (If using vanilla extract, add it to the fruit along with the orange zest and corn starch.) Toss the mixture gently to combine. Cover and macerate at room temperature for up to an hour.

Combine butter, flour, salt and sugars in a bowl. Work the mixture with a pastry blender or your fingers until you have a clumpy dough. (This is not sophisticated stuff. It will not be pretty, not uniform, not pea-sized pieces, but great walnut-scale lumps.) Add the almonds, and work them in with your fingers until they are distributed evenly throughout.

Turn the fruit out into a 10 inch pie plate or tart pan (I like to use one with pretty fluted sides, but not with a removable bottom. This mixture, even with the corn starch to thicken the juices, could leak during baking.) Top with spoonfuls of the dough, covering the top thoroughly. (It’s ok if the fruit peeks through a bit, but mostly, you want it covered.)

Bake for 40-45 minutes, until the top is golden brown. Serve hot, warm or cold. This is wonderful on its own, but decadent with vanilla ice cream, or a mixture of half creme fraiche and half whipped cream, stirred together and ever-so-slightly sweetened.

HOW YOU CAN JOIN IN SUMMER FEST:
So now it’s your turn: Have a recipe or tip that fits any of our weekly themes? Starting today, for the next five Wednesdays,  you can contribute in various ways, big or small.

Contribute a whole post, or a comment—whatever you wish. It’s meant to be fun, viral, fluid. No pressure, just delicious. The possibilities:

Simply leave your tip or recipe or favorite links in the comments below a Summer Fest post on my blog, and then go visit my collaborators and do the same.

The cross-blog event idea works best when you leave your recipe or favorite links (whether to your own blog or someone else’s) at all the host blogs. That way, they are likely to be seen by the widest audience. Everyone benefits, and some pretty great dialog starts simmering.

Or think bigger: Publish entire posts of your own, if you wish, and grab the juicy Summer Fest 2010 tomato badge (illustrated by Matt of Mattbites).

THE 2010 SCHEDULE:

• Wednesday, July 28: That’s today. CUKES ‘N ZUKES, baby.
• Wednesday, August 4: CORN. Not corny. Sweet…
• Wednesday, August 11: HERBS, GREENS & GREEN BEANS. That’s a whole lot of chlorophyll to play with.
• Wednesday, August 18: STONE FRUIT. I said “stone”, not “stoned”.
• Wednesday, August 25: TOMATOES. Assuming, unlike last summer, we are blight-free. Fingers and toes all crossed.

And in case I forget what week it is, won’t somebody remind me on Twitter? Thanks. We’ll be talking it up there, too.

That’s how a Summer Fest works.

Who’s coming to this party?
Glad you asked. An incredible line up of bloggers-extraordinaire:

Alana at Eating From the Ground Up: Stone Fruit Slump.
Sara at Cooking Channel: Savory Stone Fruit recipes.
Todd and Diane of White on Rice Couple: Riesling Poached Pluots.
Margaret at A Way to Garden: What is stone fruit, anyhow? Plus: Clafoutis batter revisited.
Caroline at The Wright Recipes: Ginger and Vanilla Poached Peaches.
The FN Dish: Paula’s Perfect Peach Cobbler.
Alison at Food2: Peachy Party Foods.
Kelly at Just a Taste: Peaches & Cream Cupcakes.
Liz on Healthy Eats: Puttin’ Up Peach Pickles, Compote and More.
Food Network UK: How to Poach a Peach.
Judy of Divina Cucina: Chocolate Amaretti Baked Apricots.
The Gilded Fork: dossier & recipes featuring peaches, apricots, nectarines, plums, cherries, almonds, coconuts.
Cate at Sweetnicks: Blueberry Peach Smoothies.
Tara at Tea & Cookies: Making Peach Jam.
Caron of San Diego Foodstuff: grilled peach parfait and coconut peach gazpacho.
Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef: gluten-free peach-blueberry buckle.
Tigress in a Jam: nectarine preserve with summer savory and white pepper.
Marilyn at Simmer Till Done: Cherry Apricot Pie with Ginger-Almond Crunch.

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