Tomato, To-mah-to

It’s tomato season!

We can’t seem to get enough of these beautiful tomatoes.  I can’t think of any other food that when it’s good, it’s very, very good, and when it’s bad, it’s horrid.  Right now, they are very, very good.  We have a friend who says that there are some days that are so hot that all he wants to eat is a tomato.  I’ve never been that hot.  But I have enjoyed some of these fresh tomato recipes.

First, Tomato Mozzarella and Basil (Barefoot Contessa Family Style).  This might be my favorite tomato recipe, and we used the fresh heirloom tomatoes from our CSA box for this.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve made this salad, and this is probably the ugliest batch I’ve ever made.  But guess what?  Still awesome.

Next up:  Tomato Mozzarella and Pesto Panini (Barefoot Contessa at Home).  There’s a reason that this isn’t an actual panini.

My dad had a panini maker for his grocery store’s deli.  He sold the store, and kept the panini maker, and then generously gave it to me.  The catch?  It was an industrial-grade panini maker, which only plugged into an industrial-grade electrical outlet.  In other words, we’d have to unplug our dryer to plug in the panini maker.  Realizing how impractical that was, we sold the panini grill, and suffered through with an electric griddle for these sandwiches instead.  We didn’t even have any fancy crusty bread, so we used regular boring sandwich bread.  Even with all of those intervening forces, these sandwiches were amazing.

Finally (for now), Greek Panzanella (from Barefoot Contessa:  How Easy is That?).  This was simply amazing, and even though the leftovers were a little soggy a day or two later, I still gobbled them up, and happily.  I approached panzanella with some trepidation, since I’d never made or eaten it before.  I needn’t have worried – as it turns out, as weird as “bread salad” sounds, it tastes pretty good.  Think of a salad with more croutons and no lettuce, and there you go.  The oregano and red wine vinaigrette used in this recipe would make a great marinade for grilled chicken to top a green salad.  All of these vegetables came from our CSA box.

Bonus item:  This is not a Barefoot Contessa recipe, but maybe it should be.  I met my friend Amber during my first week of college, and we reconnected a few years ago.  Amber is one of the funniest, most delightful, interesting, and interested people I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting.  I love that we can keep in touch through her food blog, Awake at the Whisk.  I made her Roasted Heirloom Tomato Freezer Sauce last week, and it could not have been easier.  (If you’re keeping track of how many tomatoes we’ve eaten, add in some BLTs for four adults over the weekend, and yes, I had to go to the farmers’ market to buy more tomatoes.)  I used the marinara on Eggplant Parmesan, and we gobbled it all up.

Here are the tomatoes ready to be roasted.  We had a little extra excitement as I brought in the fresh basil from the back porch – a little green worm stowed away and tried to make it into our sauce!  Luckily I spotted it before I added extra protein to the recipe.  Yikes!  I must grow really good basil if even the worms want some.

I’d love to hear about your favorite tomato recipe.  During the summer that my husband and I first met, he told me “I just love a plain tomato.  With salt and pepper.  And white bread.  And mayonnaise.”  I had to break it to him that that wasn’t exactly a “plain” tomato.  What’s your favorite way to eat tomatoes?

Summer Barbecue

Here in Minnesota, the summers are short, but beautiful and comfortable.  We try to squeeze in as many cookouts, outdoor activities, and casual entertaining opportunities as we can before the leaves start to fall.  Last week, we had a casual cookout with burgers, beans, and these beauties.

The crudite platter, which doesn’t exactly resemble the one in The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook, but isn’t it gorgeous?

Those are purple carrots from our CSA.  They are a deep red/purple on the outside, and light orange on the inside.  My 3-year-old thinks this is hilarious.

We also made the tarragon potato salad from Barefoot Contessa:  How Easy is That?

The best part about this cookout is that we got to spend some time with wonderful friends, whose family includes a few hungry teenage boys.  I love feeding hungry kids!

Truffled Popcorn

Highbrow, meet lowbrow.  You make a good match.

From Barefoot Contessa:  How Easy is That?

Roasted Figs and Prosciutto

This is a newer, fresher take on bacon-wrapped dates, and they are divine.  If you like salty and sweet combinations, you will love these.  Notice that I didn’t even have time to take the photo before they started getting gobbled up.

The recipe is from Barefoot Contessa: How Easy is That?, but if you can read the title of the recipe, you can probably figure it out on your own.  I shopped around a little for the figs.  One grocery store had them for $25/pound, but Costco had them for less than $3/pound.  Guess which one I chose?  I’ll give you a hint:  my husband is still on speaking terms with me.

 

Greek Lamb with Yogurt Mint Sauce

Here’s a hint for new parents:  if a recipe claims to be “easy for entertaining” because you can make most of it ahead of time, latch on to that recipe and assemble everything when you’re not tripping over your children during The Dreaded Witching Hour.  I made the marinade for this lamb and mixed up the yogurt sauce late one night when both of my children were (miraculously) sleeping.  The next evening, I just had to broil the lamb chops and steam a vegetable for dinner, and we felt like we were dining in a restaurant – a terribly decorated, noisy restaurant with horrible service, but a restaurant with great food nonetheless!

From Barefoot Contessa:  How Easy is That?

One side note: the yogurt sauce was VERY minty, so if you’re not wild about mint, I would drastically reduce the amount of mint, or just eliminate it altogether.

French String Bean Salad

I like green beans.  I like them plain, and even raw.  I grew up eating them straight out of my grandmother’s garden, and I can’t get enough of them.  Someone Else Who Lives In My House would prefer that they be cooked within an inch of their life, preferably with bacon.  Marriage is all about compromise, or so I’m told, and this recipe (from Barefoot Contessa: How Easy is That?) provides an easy way to get that compromise.  I would still prefer them perfectly plain, but my husband really likes this mustard dressing.  The nice thing about it is that the dressing is added after the beans are lightly steamed (and served on the side, if desired), so we can both be happy.  If only the Contessa could mitigate the thermostat wars or make a Star Trek movie that doubles as a chick flick.

Garlic Roasted Cauliflower

I know very few people who look at a head of cauliflower and can’t wait to dive into it.  There seem to be two approaches for cooking it:  disguise it to make it taste like something else (e.g., mashed cauliflower to resemble mashed potatoes, pureed cauliflower in macaroni and cheese), or do something creative with it to make it a little more palatable in its original state (like here and here).

This recipe, from Barefoot Contessa: How Easy is That?, fits into the latter category.  It was good, and it probably wins our “least bad” cauliflower award.  How’s that for a ringing endorsement?  I added some kohlrabi from the CSA box to this batch.

Buttermilk Ranch Dressing

So long, Hidden Valley.  This salad dressing is amazing, and I may never buy the commercial version again.  We eat a lot of salad this time of year, and our CSA does a good job of supplying us with lettuce and salad greens for most of the summer.  I think that this dressing (from Barefoot Contessa: How Easy is That?) will be a staple in our refrigerator for the rest of the season.  Don’t be intimidated by the long list of ingredients, because this makes a big enough batch to make several salads.

Herbed Ricotta Bruschettas

I made cheese!

Between this homemade ricotta (Barefoot Contessa How Easy is That?) and the peach ice cream earlier this week, I’m feeling like a regular dairy maid.  I didn’t have any chives, so I used fresh parsley instead.

 

Ultimate Peach Ice Cream

Other than my kids, this might be the best thing I’ve ever made.  I’ll admit up front that I did not use the Grand Marnier or Sauternes.  Every time I’ve made ice cream with any kind of liqueur in it, the alcohol flavoring has dominated the ice cream, and that just bums me out, especially because ice cream is kind of a pain to make.  Until this recipe (from Barefoot Contessa: How Easy is That?), I had never made ice cream with an egg-based custard, and I was always disappointed in the results.  The bowl for the ice cream maker sat in my freezer, taking up space and mocking me.  Well, it mocks me no longer.  This is, quite simply, amazing, and now I know that the effort of the egg custard is well worth it.  Make this.  Enjoy it.

Take my advice, though, and don’t try to separate ten (!) eggs while holding an infant.  That was messy.

PS  The word “ultimate” seems to be a theme in recent Barefoot Contessa cookbooks.  What’s up with that?  What happened to the penultimate peach ice cream?

PPS I cannot seem to stop buying peaches.  The fourth flat of them (each containing about a dozen peaches) sits on my kitchen counter now.  The method for separating the skin from the peach, as described in this recipe and others, is so, so easy, so my freezer is slowly being filled with whatever doesn’t get thrown into a baked good or ice cream.