My New Favorite Way to Eat Tomatos and Zucchini

Otherwise known as "Zucchini Garlic 'Bread'."

This was something I saw on Redacted Recipes and immediately when I saw it... I knew. THIS recipe would be amazing. I even shared it before I tried it myself! And oh... was I right.

The recipe is basic: zucchini sliced in half lengthwise (quarter down the center as needed for huge zucchinis). Brush with olive oil and S&P. Place on a baking sheet lined with foil (for easy cleanup) and bake at 350 for 10 minutes.

Pull from the oven and turn on the broiler. Top the baked squash with minced garlic (zucchini can handle alot of garlic without feeling like you are ready to battle vampires) and then grated parmesan.

Return to the oven and broil for 10 minutes. The cheese with be golden brown and slightly crispy looking. Let it cool for a minute so you dont remove all the skin on your tongue... and then have at it! A healthy version of garlic bread, and a great way to use up all that squash! Yellow summer squash would probably be good too but I have only made it with zucchini.

For tomatos - I recommend a firm red beefsteak type. I tried with a yellow heirloom of some sort and it just turned to mush on me - and was too sweet. A more acidic tomato is better, in my opinion. I dont care for green tomatos but Ill bet they would be good too if you like them!

Do the same thing as the zucchini - but skip the first 10 minutes of baking and go straight to the broil. You want the tomato to retain some shape and structure so it doesnt fall apart when you go to eat it.

Tomato doesnt take as much garlic (learn from my vampire-hunting experience!) but I personally love it with a liberal amount of kosher salt, and piles ot good parmesan. It is messy to eat - have lots of napkins on hand... but oh so worth it. To me, this is the perfect way to enjoy the great tomatos of the summertime!

Pork and Eggplant 'Parmesan'

This dish was born out of "what veggies do I need to use up before the next farm share..." And like most dishes that are thrown together with no real plan... it was awesome! One of those meals where you really wish you had written down what the heck you did!

The best I can recall...

A boneless trimmed pork chop per person, and 1 medium to largish eggplant sliced thick, all dredged in 1 beaten egg, followed by a coating of breadcrumbs with grated parmesan, oregano, thyme, and whatever other herbs you like mixed in - coat well. I pan fried the meat and eggplant with a little bit of olive oil (higher heat to start then drop the temp to finish the meat through and cook the eggplan till juuuuust barely soft all the way through - I dont like it too soggy).

Meanwhile, I made a "sauce" of sorts with a couple heirloom tomatos and summer squash and zucchini and onion and garlic (brown it all up in some olive oil first), a small can of diced tomatos plus their juices, and some herbs - dried, fresh. I used fresh basil and thyme, and dried oregano, rosemary. I simmered it all together plus salt and pepper to taste until it was nice and saucey.

Our mozzarella was bad so I just topped it with Parmesan... it was SO good!

Also - on a whim I added the leftover "sauce" to scrambled eggs and mozzarella (I bought some more) for breakfast... normally I dont like that kind of thing (sauce, salsa, etc in my eggs) but it was SO FREAKIN GOOD. Ryan also doesnt normally like it that way... and loved it.

Such a summer farm fresh meal - love knowing everything (save the pork) was local and in season and so so fresh!

Homegrown.... PIZZA

This month's Homegrown Gourmet challenge features... PIZZA!

Elizabeth at Elizabeth's Cooking Experiments is the host, and I think chose a great challenge! I ended up making two different kinds (since most pizza dough recipes make a ton anyhow... and I had great ideas for a pizza for my home, and one for DHs hometown too!)

First, the pizza for CT: this is basically a local pizza. We have a fabulous farm nearby, Rosedale Farm, with the best corn... anywhere! This is where we get all our produce from in the summer, and fall, thanks largely to a weekly farm membership. All the toppings for this pizza were included in that weeks bag even! This pizza featured roasted garlic mashed with olive oil and smeared as the 'sauce,' local heirloom tomatos, sliced, fresh basil chiffonade, super sweet yellow corn sliced off the cob, and two medium balls of local fresh mozzarella cheese, sliced. It was SO good! Even better the next day, reheated. Only thing I would do differently is use way more garlic - the flavor did not come through as much as I would have liked.

Pizza dough recipe from Cooks Illustrated, online. I made the crust as thin as I could without breaking!

Pizza numero two is representative of DHs hometown of Johnstown PA. In western PA, pierogies are crazy popular. They are sold at almost every booth at the local city fair every year... where I had never really heard of them before! They exist up north... but generally our filled pasta of choice is ravioli :)

Normally, pierogies are potato filled pasta, that are cooked through and served with carmelized onions. They are very yummy and very unhealthy! There are a ton of variations, so I chose our favorite to base this pizza on - the cheddar bacon pierogi. MMmmmm...

The crust of the pizza would be the pasta. I topped it with lots of carmelized onions, and then mashed potatos (I used small new potatos, boiled until cooked through, and roughly mashed with some butter and milk added to taste) that I mixed with about a cup of cabot shredded sharp cheddar (the best bagged pre-shredded cheddar in my area IMO) and a package of that precooked bacon... roughly shredded. When the pizza was almost done, I added even more cheddar on top of it.

WOW. This pizza was REALLY good! I really did feel like the flavor captured the essence of pierogies, too.

I dont really ever make homemade pizza, but I may be a convert... this stuff was good, and easier than expected! Thanks for the challenge Elizabeth :)

Roasted Zucchini Ribbons

Another use for the piles of summertime squash! I thinly sliced zucchini with my mandoline and then wrapped in paper towels for a bit to try to get some of the moisture out. I put the ribbons in a tupperware container with olive oil, kosher salt, and minced garlic, sealed and and shook to coat.
Then, I laid them out on cooling racks that were on cookie sheets.

Roast at 450 for about 10 minutes or until browning - serve immediately (mine sat out and were cold... but still yummy!)

Chicken with Squash

This is a dish I threw together using some veggies we had on hand from our Rosedale Farm membership and it was fantastic!

Ingredients:

2 chicken breasts (cut in half and flattened a bit)

2 medium to large tomatos, diced

Garlic. Lots of it.

1 onion, diced

salt and pepper

italian herbs (oregano, rosemary, and thyme are what I used)

Zucchini and Summer Squash, diced

Olive Oil

Parmesan Cheese

This is a dish I cooked by rote so the amounts are to taste/what you have. I think I used 1 large zucchini and 2 small yellow squash, so the amounts are about even.

In a large pan, heat oil over medium high. Add garlic (I just used the frozen Trader Joe garlic - I find they arent as strong tasting so throw in extras) Season the chicken with salt, pepper, herbs and add to hot pan. When you flip teh chicken (7 minutes or so, well browned) also add the tomatos. Pan should still be hot so the tomatos will break down and brown a bit too. Stir the tomatos occasionally and cook to finish the chicken.

Meanwhile in a second large pan, cook the squash and onions plus oil over medium high heat to brown. Add the squash and onion mixture to the chicken and tomatos once both are well browned and the chicken is cooked through. Top with grated parmesan cheese and add some more garlic, salt, pepper, and herbs to taste. The half breasts plus lots of hearty veggies made this a good dish if you are trying to up your veggies at dinner/lower your meat intake.

SO good and came together quickly and easily. You could do it all in one pan, but them not likely to get the sear on the veggies, which I liked. This would be good with a whole wheat pasta, too. Maybe rotini.

Rosedales Farm Share: Final Take

Wednesday I picked up our last farm share. It was 10 weeks, paid in advance, of a variety of local produce. What a wonderful treat it was all summer to get to try new fruits and veggies, and get a surprise every week of local farm fresh produce! If the Epsteins do this again we will definitely participate!

Anyone near Simsbury, definitely check out Rosedales - best corn out there!

This week we got: 2 baby pumpkins, a butternut squash (hmmm roasted? soup? decisions decisions!), 8 ears of corn, a bunch of scallions, a green pepper and 2 of the long skinny ones, lots of fingerling potatos (never had these before and am excited to try!) and red potatos, 3 tomatos, 2 plums, 4 apples (apple cake?), 4 pears (maybe pear soup!) and an orange. Whew!

And I bought some other stuff including the last blueberries of the season and what I expect are the last gorgeous raspberries too... goodbye summer!

Rosedale's Farm Share Week 7

I think I missed a week... darnit! This week we got: 8 ears of corn, peppers (green, white, and long and skinny), a small pot of mums (we got maroon ones), a couple peaches and some baby plum-ish but miniature fruits, some lettuce, some tomatos - regular and cherry, potatos maybe?

Farm Share

This week we got:

2 peaches

2 nectarines

2 plums

8 ears of corn

1 green pepper, 1 white pepper and one long pepper (???)

a few tomatos

1 yellow tomato

2 regular potatos

3 red potatos

1 mini loaf of blueberry crumb bread

3 Sunflowers

:) 2 more days till the next set!

Farm Share Week 5!

We sure got a ton of great stuff this week! 9 ears of FABULOUS corn (the "super sweet" hybrid they grow), a head of iceberg (gag), a green and a white pepper, blueberries, peaches, yellow squash, basil, 2 huge tomatos, cukes, beets, and a cantelope! No flowers but they made up for it with all the other yummy stuff! Luckily my Hydrangeas are almost ready to cut so I can still enjoye some flowers inside :)

FARM SHARE WEEK 4

This week we got: a head of iceberg (need ideas... i dont like iceberg salads... what else can I make it into?), corn, a green pepper, cantelope, peaches, weird yellow fruits - no clue what they are, yellow squash, potatos, an onion and some flowers. *note: you can see the new color in our living rm/dining rm in these two pics - Rhubarb by Benjamin Moore*

Weekly Farm Share

So I have realized that the hardest part about blogging for me is finding the time to upload pics. It doesnt take long... but doesnt seem to happen! So hopefully tonight I will upload and have piles to blog about... but until then, last weeks farm share!

6 ears of butter and sugar corn - they have their own hydrid super sweet corn (solid yellow kernals) in now so Im hoping that is what we get next week! We didnt have the last of it until Sat night - a long time to wait to eat corn from wed, but it was STILL so good and sweet - gotta love good local corn :)

4 huge sweet potatos - have cooked one for Ryan a few days ago (trying to lose weight so no taters for me!) the rest will last a long time!

4 summer squash - I think ill put one into Ryans pasta tonight (Im being super nice and making salmon for me and spaget. for him!) and saute or roast one for myself

2 peaches - yummy

piles of grapes (no me gusta but luckily Ryan loves them!)

Sunflowers - I only JUST threw the ones away from the previous week too - they last forever!

Lettuce (yumm!)

Cukes

Ummm I think that was it... nothin too fancy or crazy but plenty of goodies for us to work our way through! I bought some local tomatos too, and some basil that is in a little bouquet by the sink - not only is it yummy but its pretty and makes the kitchen smell fantastic!

Cant wait to see what we get next week!

FARM SHARE: week 1 and 2

Figured I would record what we got each week with our farm share, just so i remember!

The first week, we got a bunch of flowers, 4 ears of corn, 3 tomatos, a pint of blues, 3 nectarines, 2 peppers, 1 cuke, a bunch of beets

here is what we got this week: LOCAL corn (yay!) 8 ears, 3 tomatos, 4 red potatos, 4 summer squash, 3 nectarines, blueberries, a red and a yellow pepper, and a bunch of carrots. Yummy! :) has some corn last night and that will last us 2-3 more nights, basically we have veggies for most of if not all of the week :) Carrots will be roasted, I ate the peppers in my lunch (with hummus yum) squash sauteed with onions, red potatos cooked with herbs... i got some over-ripe bananas for 19 cents a pound too, might try to turn my banana bread recipe into banana blueberry muffins. mmmmmmm...

Now I just need to figure out the protein to go with it all!