Summer Food Goals

2022 Edition

Does anyone else get summer fever at markets this time of year?

I always look forward to the photos my gardening friends post on social media.  June, July, August, they proudly share the bounty they've grown in their backyards or in community gardens.

When I had a yard, the most I could manage was herbs.  Born without a green thumb, I was fiercely proud of those herbs.  During the summer and fall in Michigan, I would grab my kitchen shears and walk outside to gather fresh herbs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  In October, I'd harvest sage, rosemary, and thyme to use at Thanksgiving, just in case an early frost decided to land.

My culinary life bloomed in Michigan. My mom lived an hour away on five acres of land.  Now she had a green thumb. For the first time in her life, she had raised bed gardens where she grew tomatoes, peppers, squash, lettuces.  Those lettuces!  I'd never seen so many different kinds.  That was my favorite crop to to collect and take home with me.  I loved the tender leaves of oak leaf and red sails, the different colors of loose leaf baby lettuce.  All of a sudden, my salads had character!  Mom even grew kohlrabi, (a vegetable that's still kind of a mystery to me now).

I started taking cooking classes.  I earned my culinary degree and worked at a farm-to-table kitchen.  If you’ve read one of my previous issues, you know that visiting farmers' markets became my frequent pastime.

When we lived in San Francisco, I was lucky to be able to walk to the farmers' market at the Ferry Building on Saturday.  I volunteered there and helped pick and prep vegetables and herbs for cooking demos.  After my work was done, I'd visit the stalls to do some grocery shopping and pick a pastry for my walk home by the bay.

The farmers' markets in Chicago were small, but mighty.  Now that I think about it, I could walk to the markets there too.  Was that a subconscious prerequisite for choosing a neighborhood?  The Chicago markets had excellent produce, a lot of it grown in Michigan, a stand or two with donuts or artisan bread, and great coffee.

Nowadays, I find my summer produce at the grocery store.  I'm still learning the in's and out's of Florida farmers' markets.  I need to work on that.

I look forward to the dishes that have become tradition in the summer months.  I have my usual stand-by's.  A stellar BLT when tomatoes arrive.  Daily Caprese salads when tomatoes arrive.  (G has a lifelong love of tomatoes. In August, he’ll eat them like apples.) Summer fruit for ice cream, homemade popsicles, and cold beverages on the lanai.

This time of year I set some food goals for the summer. I started doing this in the last few years because I felt like I’d blink and summer was over. Wait! I meant to make this and that and that and…

Drum roll, please, for this year's summer food goals:

• Make granitas (adult sno-cones!)

• Cook more seafood (especially fish)

• Eat and cook and bake stone fruit

• Make something nostalgic from our childhoods

• Make copious amounts of gazpacho

• Make pickles (from every vegetable imaginable)

What are your favorite summer meals or stand-by’s? Do you garden? Let me know!

Thanks again for reading. I care about you. Please don’t forget to eat your greens.

***Written to Lyle Lovett’s Live in Texas.