Summer Recipes

I love seasonal summer foods! There is something about them that makes me want to gobble up as much of the goodness as I can while it last! Andy doesn't like to follow recipes, he's more of a real chef, but I'm happy to admit that I'm more of a recipe follower. Occasionally, when I'm sure of flavorful combinations, I'll venture out on my own, but for the most part I do as told!

One of our all time favorite recipe books is, Forever Summer by Nigella Lawson. I must admit that not every recipe in this book appeals to me, but at the same time everyone that I've tried has been an off the chart hit with us as well as who ever else has been served it!

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Here are some regulars in our house:

• Chocolate Raspberry Pavola - This is a super-easy, super-impressive meringue-like summer dessert. Depending on what's in season, we make it with raspberries, blackberries or even blue berries and there are NEVER any leftovers...enough said!
• Happiness (or "sunshine") Soup - The book calls this "happiness" soup, but i can't help but calling it sunshine soup due to its radiant color.  Its a great use for summer squash. I follow the recipe to a "t", but I do dial back the lemon juice so that its not too sour on the pallette. Its a very different, but very yummy soup!
• Thai Beef in Lettuce Wraps - These make for a great light summer supper.
• Rice Paper Rolls - These are another wonderful light summer treat packed with the refreshing flavors of mint and cucumber! (In Raleigh, I've found rice sheets at Total Oriental Foods near the Walmart on New Hope Church Road)

Bon Appetit!

Scrumptous London Broil

Lately Lowes Foods has been having some super deals on London Broil and while its not grass fed and local, I've caved in due to the $2.97/lb price tag.

I found a super delish recipe for a marinade that I've made several times and it has been a hit with all to whom it was served. Here's the recipe from Our State Magazine:

• ½ cup oil
• ¼ cup soy sauce
• 4 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
• 2 tablespoons wine vinegar
• 2 teaspoons dry mustard
• ¾ teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon coarse fresh pepper
• ½ teaspoon dried parsley flakes
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 2 to 3 pounds London broil
• Meat tenderizer

Combine all ingredients (except meat and tenderizer), and stir. Put ¼ to ½ of the mixture in a plastic bag with meat to marinate 6 to 8 hours or overnight. Reserve remaining mixture for sauce. Remove meat from marinade; discard used marinade. Sprinkle meat with tenderizer. Grill immediately. Heat reserved sauce to a boil before serving.

I've served this sliced over mixed greens salads with blue cheese and berries, but more recently I made it with dill green beans and baked acorn squash with maple syrup and butter. YUM! The left overs made for some great sandwiches too!

What do to with all that....Zucchini

A friend had a bountiful crop of zucchini, and was recently seeking out ideas for what to do with it all. I shared a few recipes and ideas with her that I've been collecting and thought I'd share them here, as well. 'Tis the season for zucchini, afterall.

• Zapallitos Revueltos (Scrambled Zucchini) - This is still one of our favorite summer stables.
• Zucchini Cakes (from Relish Magazine) - Quite possibly the perfect vegetarian crab cake. Declared "delish" by veggie eaters and carnivores alike!
• "Good as Crack" Zucchini Bread (from All Recipes) - I made up two loaves of this this weekend it took it to a friend who declared it "good as crack". I substituted 1/2 of the walnuts for chocolate chips - can't go wrong there! Seriously delicious!
• Brown Butter Squash with Garlic - We've also recently been cooking down zucchini and summer squash with minced garlic and butter over low heat. Very yummy!

Here are a few more that I've "clipped" for safekeeping, but haven't yet tried:

• Bean-free hummus - Swap the usual can of chickpeas for one large zucchini that's been peeled, trimmed, and chopped. Toss in the food processor with lemon juice, tahini, olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper; process until smooth for a light, creamy dip. (This is from Kiwi Magazine: Growing Families the Great, Natural and Organic Way - a freebie from the Stoneyfield's reward program.)
  
• Zucchini fries - Slice zucchini into sticks (about the size of your finger), and then dredge in a beaten egg and seasoned bread crumbs. Bake at 400 for 10 minutes (Another one from Kiwi Magazine)
• Zucchini Cookies - from my current read, "Animal Vegetable Miracle"

Roasting a whole chicken

Last week I decided to attempt being a grown up and roast a whole chicken. This was a big deal for me as I'm pretty scared of raw chicken. I purchased my free range chicken from Homestead Harvest Farm at the North Raleigh Farmer's Market. After perusing several recipes, I settled on one that called for lots of garlic and rosemary from Dean and Deluca- can't go wrong there!

As you can see in the photo my ratio of vegetables to bird was a little off, but the veggies were super tasty. I found that my 3.25 roast cooked considerably faster than the recipe said, but all in all it was a pretty tasty first attempt. Not sure it will be a regular at our house, but its a nice (and pretty) option.

"The Easy Lay" - Chickens!

Eggs from four of "the girls"

We've wanted to get chickens for several years... long before they were trendy, I promise! I first heard about urban chickens about five years ago from a friend in Raleigh's Historic Oakwood neighborhood. She was setting up her coops. When we moved downtown, we considered them, but we weren't quite ready for them in the yard when we had to uproot and head to the suburbs. When we settled on our 1/2 acre in N. Raleigh, Andy assured me we could have chickens, in time, and we were pleasantly surprised to find out one of our cul-de-sac neighbors already has them!!!

For the last 18 months, I was too busy feeding the "three hungry hippos" to consider having anything else that needed daily feeding and watering - in fact, I even ruled out having a Christmas tree last year saying "I don't need anything else that needs to be fed." But, when my Oakwood friend announced she was moving and needed to rehome her chickens, I couldn't resist.

And so, we've added five new girls to our family and established the "The Easy Lay" Chicken Yard:

Omelet, the Australorp and "boss"

Nugget, the buff orpington (photo by Jody Sorofman)

Silver, the silver-laced wyandotte (photo by Jody Sorofman)

My "funky chicken", Foggy Bottom, the silkie bantam (photo by Jody Sorofman)

We also have, Lovie, the Ameraucana, but I'm lacking a picture of her.

The timing was perfect since as a family we're eating close to 2 dozen eggs a week and buying free range eggs adds up! Besides, since Mason passed away, I've really missed having pets. We actually moved their coops from my friend's and have gotten them all setup in the back yard by the shed. Here's a picture of their digs. Next up is scraping together a "The Easy Lay - Chicken Yard" sign and putting up a 20" high white picket fence to frame their yard.

As usual, I did some chicken reading before we got our girls. Here's what I picked up and would recommend.

• The Joy of Keeping Chickens by Jennifer Megyesi
• Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens by Gail Damerow

Branching out

So life has changed a lot for me in the last 2 years. In fact, just saying that is kind of an understatement. These days I find myself home a lot. My focus has turned from a once busy corporate and agency career to taking care of my home and my kiddos all the time. And while I never really saw myself a full-time stay-at-home mom, here I am. I am trying my best to "bloom where planted".

In the old days, Andy did most of the cooking, but now I cook most of our meals and am experiencing a renaissance of culinary passion. Its nice to be home during the day to cook things the right way as compared to the past when we got home from work late and just wanted warm food to fill our hungry bellies as fast as possible. Delights like roasting whole chicken and making and baking baguettes and tarlets are new options for me that I'm delving into and loving. I'm shopping our local farmer's market every week and have actually established a relationship with the farmer's that grow our produce!

I've also been able to take on some fun crafty projects for the house and the kids. I've always loved crafting, but in the past I had no time for it (and frankly I could afford to buy a lot of what I wanted).  Lately, I've enjoyed sewing some clothes for my girls and doing some fun household projects.

At the same time, I haven't had as much time to work in the yard as I'd prefer as I'm indoors with the kiddos most of my days. My gardening budget was also more than exhausted last year with our landscaping projects. I am, however, taking on a few outdoors projects, like the chickens, an outdoor shower and vegetable garden beds for the Spring.

I share all of this to say that I'm branching out on the blog to cover some of my other interests - I'm a multi faceted girl afterall....some might say I'm a little too faceted - fractured even! I'd like to share some fun other house and garden projects and recipes going on around here. Hope you don't mind!

Next year this time....

The past few Spring planting seasons have passed me by and this year I've decided to not let next year get ahead of me. My timing is perfect as the three amigos are eating us out of house and home AND I finally have enough sun to produce a decent harvest. Andy's also encouraged me to read Animal Vegetable Miracle and watch Food Inc and so I've decided its about time this NC girl gets going in a vegetable garden! We are excited to see how and what we can produce off of our modest half acre lot - I guess suburbia does have some benefits!

As my foray into anything typically begins, I started doing lots of reading earlier this summer. Here are a couple of my top organic gardening picks that are laying scattered throughout my house marked up and highlighted like someone getting major major plastic surgery. No kindle or ipad here, still doing it the old fashioned way with dog eared corners and highlighter in hand!

• Backyard Homestead, by Carleen Madigan. Great resource on info for doing almost anything in your backyard from gardening to keeping chickens, fruit and nut trees, and even bees and lifestock. 
• Organic Gardening for the 21st Century, by John Fedor. This is an awesome resource for organic vegetable gardening. Everything from soil testing and fixing to, gardening planning, planting and harvesting to preserving and canning your foods. 
• Organic Gardening Magazine - Got this one free from Stoneyfield.

I've plotted out my beds. So far, I've been able to negotiate  two 4' x 16' beds and one 4' x 8' bed from my "yard boy"! So, currently I'm figuring what I can plant in my ~150 sq. feet of garden. More on that later when I've plotted out better plans for the various planting seasons, succession plantings and crop rotation. Its a lot to figure out and I have a whole new respect for our farmers.

So for this year I'm eating local produce from Cane Creek Farms, but next year I hope to be eating real local: backyard local. And so it begins.....