Summer Salsa Salad

This week was a summery pick for the food matters project.  Jenn chose Bittman's Corn-Avacado Salad (with a little something seared on top).  It's been so hot that we've tried to avoid cooking as much as possible and decided to make an (almost) cook-free seasonal salsa/salad.  While corn isn't quite in season here in Virginia, and avocados are never in season, we incorporated some delicious vegetables from our CSA and local farmer's market.

We had some dried black beans on hand, soaked them overnight and then boiled until soft.  But to make salad completely cook free you could easily used canned beans.  To the beans we added a peach, tomato, scallions, and okra.  We grilled the okra to try to get rid of a little of the sliminess, but it still created a pretty gooey salsa we will probably leave the okra out next time, or find a better way to cook it.  We dressed the salad with olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper.  A simple summer salsa salad that can be enjoyed with your grain of choice!

For Bittman's original recipe visit Vanilla Lemon and enjoy your own seasonal salsa!

Repost: Stuffed Vegetable Rolls

We have been away on vacation the past week and a half and didn't have the chance to cook this weeks  food matters recipe - beet "sandwiches".  However, we realized that about this time last year we posted about another unique take on sandwiches.  We used a similar method in our recipe as Bittman's recipe - layering roasted vegetables with a goats cheese filling - and the result was delicious.

We'll definitely be making these rolls again throughout this summer and hope that you can enjoy them too!  Check out our post from August 26, 2011 for our complete vegetable roll recipe.

Also, find Bittman's beet "sandwich" recipe on My Wholefood Romance.

Tea Sandwiches

Tea sandwiches - what a silly, yet fun, lunch idea!  Most of our sandwiches made at home consist of peanut butter, jelly, or hummus spread on bread so making these dainty tea sandwiches was a fun change of pace.  Not only did the different ingredients make them good, but taking the time to make each one made them all the more special.

Aura chose this weeks recipe for the food matters project and all of Bittman's combinations looked tasty so we decided to try one of his and make one of our own.  We picked some shelling peas at our CSA this past weekend and followed Bittman's recipe for gingered pea spread (peas, ginger, garlic, mint, oil).  We also combined some feta cheese, yogurt, and dill for another spread.  We layered these spreads with cucumbers and a multigrain bread cut into small pieces.

We had lots of fun with this recipe will certainly be incorporating more tea sandwiches (though perhaps not cut into tiny pieces) into our lunch rotation.

Click over to Dinner with Aura to see Bittman's original recipes.