Wonderful Bounty

This time of year, the weight of the harvest really starts to increase, so bring your strong bags and muscles to the pick up room! The sheer variety and amount of produce makes it pretty easy to figure out what to eat each day. Please share how you enjoyed your harvest by emailing me at lindadansbury@comcast.net and please put Anchor Run in the subject line. Here is some of how I enjoyed my harvest this week.

Summer squash, eggplant, scallions - grilled veggies along with our protein for the night, which kept the kitchen cool and clean up to a minimum. Cut the veggies up, drizzled with a bit of olive oil and grill, being careful to turn them so they don't burn. Removed from grill and sprinkled a bit of salt - we like to use a sea salt for finishing plus chopped herbs. This is one of my favorite ways to enjoy these. Any leftovers can be made into or added to a salad.

Lettuce, summer squash, garlic scapes - made the Warm Sausage with Summer Squash Salad. Again, this is a go-to dish for my house on a warm, summer night.

Summer squash, garlic scapes, basil, scallions, green beans, tomatoes - a couple of weeks ago, I added a new recipe to this site called Summer Squash Noodles with Early Summer Veggies and Basil Vinaigrette. It was originally a recipe calling for asparagus and frozen peas. We like it so much that I changed it up last night. I started by sauteing scallions and locally raised mushrooms and a few cut up green beans. When they were to desired texture, I added a few cut up cherry tomatoes and moved them around until the juices started to be released. I then added the summer squash noodles and stirred them until warm, removed pan from heat and added some of the Basil Vinaigrette - it was delicious! And...I am thinking of renaming the dish to say Summer Squash Noodles with Whatever Else you want to put in the Dish...!

Cilantro, Thai Basil, pepper - for anyone that has read my articles for years, you know I like southeast Asian food. Last night we grilled a whole fish and I made a Thai sauce for topping it - combined cilantro, Thai basil, hot chili pepper (frozen from last year), fish sauce, tamarind paste, brown sugar, water, thinly sliced galangal (can use ginger) and water in food processor. Then put in small saucepan and added a chopped up sweet pepper. Simmered for a few minutes while fish grilled. Removed fish fillets from bones, topped with the sauce and grated some fresh lime zest over.

Scallions, garlic scapes, green beans, summer squash, greens, herbs - made a large stir fry - there are so many recipes on line that I have only posted a few of them on this site. I do some type of stir fry just about every week. Once you do them a few times, they become pretty easy and fun to make. Chop up whatever you want to use - don't worry about what veggies a recipe lists - I always incorporate an onion flavor and garlic flavor and I also love ginger, but if you don't that's okay. I also make sure I have a good combination of veggies so the final dish ends up having both soft and crunchy elements in it. And, I always finish the dish with a bright flavor - chopped fresh herbs and/or a squeeze of lime.