After making myself an unusually good salad lunch (this bean salad above: ripe tomato, cucumber, feta, oregano, salami, and red wine vinegar), I sat down this weekend to dream up some summer meals for the month of July. .
I usually start with Mark Bittman’s classic 2007 article Summer Meals for inspiration. Most of the “recipes” are really just ideas – fresh, in season, simple meals. Lots of seafood. In the summer I need things to be easy, not get the kitchen too hot, and make me feel vaguely like I’m in middle school summer again.
Shopping is a little bit more relaxed – Trader Joes and Whole Foods for some basics, my farm share, and I like to pick things up at Farmers Market – I’m lucky to have a weekend market right down the street.
In Season (in Massachusetts)
- Fruit: end of the strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, peaches mid-month. I’m still gorging myself on cherries (mostly Ranier), and typically buy whatever is on sale at the store. The melons starting – watermelon, cantelope.
- Vegetables: Lettuces, Green Beans, Beets, Bok Choy, Broccoli, Cabbage, Carrots, Cauliflower, Kale, Chard, Corn, Cucumbers, Eggplant, Leeks, Peppers, Spinach, Zucchini/Squash, Tomatoes (at least hot house). My fresh herbs are all doing well in the planter: parsley, basil, dill, cilantro, oregano.
Cooking Projects:
- Nan’s Gazpacho: my grandmother used to make large containers of gazpacho all summer long to take to Maine.
- Jordan Marsh’s Blueberry Muffins. This classic recipe from Marian Burros in the NYTimes. I think of my grandparents whenever I eat blueberry muffins (although admittedly those were more likely to be from Market Basket or Costco.)
Recipes: (I mostly use NYTimes Cooking app for specific recipes outside of my own cookbook collection.) Here are a few I’ve bookmarked:
- Melissa Clark’s Pasta Salad
- Colu Henry White Bean Caprese
- Blackberry Corn Cobbler
- Marian Burros Plum Torte (early!)
The List Summer Items:
- Summer Corn + Tomato Salad
- Cold Peanut Noodles with Chicken and Cucumber
- Grilled Hot Dogs and Baked Beans
- Kraft Dinner Mac + Cheese from Canada
- Can of B+M Brown Bread with Nutella
- Watermelon and Feta Salad
- S’mores
- Strawberry Shortcake
- Köfte and Shepherd’s Salad, and cold Ayran
- Fried Hamsi (little fish) with lemony salad
- Fried fish tucked in bread
What to Eat When I’m Tired and Don’t Want To Cook:
- Trader Joe’s Chicken Drumellas and a bag of broccoli never disappoints.
- Tinned Fish Rice Bowl. If I’m a little more ambitious I can bake fish from this. Usually I add some cucumber, avocado, rice vinegar, seaweed, ginger.
- Taco salad. Ground meat from the freezer with taco seasoning. Cheese. Chopped tomato. Sour Cream.
- Lobster Cobb: lobster, blue cheese, tomatoes, avocado.
- TJ’s Lamb Vindaloo + TJ’s Cumin Marinated Chickpeas + Yogurt
Eating Out:
- Lobster Roll Quest (I’ll aim for one every week or two.)
- Pammy’s
- Mochiko Chicken Sandwich
- Rancatore’s Chocolate Shake
- An Italian Sandwich (from Monica’s, DePasquale, or Linden St. Deli)
- A cider donut (even though it’s early in the season)
- A Flo’s Hot Dog
- Barnacle Billy’s (Steamers and a Crab Roll)
