What are your favorite seasonal foods?

[smirkymonkey]

Your favorite summer treat or meal that you only have around this time of year?

i think my choices would definitely be:

Watermelon - Cold and Seedless!
Fresh Corn on the Cob
Cucumber/Tomato/Red Onion Salad w/ Feta and EV Olive Oil/Red Wine Vinaigrette
Corn, Black Bean, Cherry Tomato, Avocado, Red Onion Salad in a Lime Cilantro Vinaigrette
Nectarines and Peaches
Blueberries
Grilled Fish/Seafood w/ Chimichurri Sauce
Rhubarb Sauce/Anything w/ Rhubarb in it


That's it off the top of my head, but i am sure there is much more. How about you?

[elleng]

1. Fresh local strawberries;

they're all gone now.

[smirkymonkey]

10. Oh, yes!

Berries! Strawberries, raspberries, etc. They are so delicious but so expensive these days. When I was young we used to find wild strawberries growing all over the place in the summer. They were really tiny, but they were so sweet and delicious. So much better tasting than the large cultivated ones you get in the store these days.

Still, I find that to bring out the true flavor of the large berries, it's best to cook them down a bit w/ a little water (sugar not needed unless you have a real sweet tooth) and then chill them. Can eat plain, over ice cream, cheese cake, pound cake, yogurt, etc. They are quite delicious, but need a little work to bring out the full flavor.

[samplegirl]

3. Chicken Shishkabobs

And vegetables on the grill. Homemade lemonade.
Seafood on the grill.
Spinach salad with raspberries, blueberries and
red onion and shaved Romano cheese with a cherry and stone ground mustard dressing.

Cucumber salad. Blood oranges, black cherries and
Cantaloupe.

And waiting on our Ohio grown tomatoes!

[smirkymonkey]

11. Oh, that all sounds so delicious!

I would definitely love to come to your place for a July 4th cookout! You sound like a wonderful chef!

[electric_blue68]

27. Shishkebob!

Being half Greek-American lamb shiskebob was the thing in warm weather.
Cubes with cut onions, peppers, and tomatoes! 🥰
Maaaybe marinated in a bit if olive oil, garlic, and oregano before hand.

However - picky eater that I formally was, I missed out on ?10+ summers until I started liking it in my early 20's!

[Rhiannon12866]

4. Grapes and cherries!

Just got my second bag of fresh grapes of season - and the cherries were out when I stopped at the grocery today, but I decided to wait until next time since I still have all those grapes!

[smirkymonkey]

5. Oh yes, forgot about those!

I love them both too! Especially the bing cherries and concord grapes that we used to get off my grandmother's grape vine. They were so sweet and delicious! They had seeds in them, but they were just the best grapes I have ever had!

[Rhiannon12866]

8. Oh, my grandmother had those grapes, too!

The neighborhood kids used to sneak in and steal them, so I'd bark to scare them off since I knew my dog would join in! We sounded like a whole pack of dogs!

[smirkymonkey]

12. LOL! I can just imagine that! So funny!

Did she have the grapevine over the driveway? My grandmother had that toward the end of the driveway and we would all sit out underneath in in the summer to protect us from the sun. All her brothers and sisters had grapevines as well. Some of them made wine, but she didn't. Was your grandmother Italian as well?

[Rhiannon12866]

18. She had a circular driveway and it went by a fence where the grapes grew

There was also rhubarb growing in some sort of enclosed area right next to the fence. Back in the day (before my time), the fence surrounded the paddock where the horses hung out. There was also a barn there and the older grandkids (there were 4 of us girls) got to sleep on cots in the barn when the entire family got together. My grandmother slept there with us and there was a victrola and old Thomas Edison records that we got to play.

And my grandmother was the one WASP in the family, but she was also a world traveler. During my lifetime, she took trips to both India and Kenya. And I went with her to Ireland (with my parents) and to the USSR (just before it fell) with her and her peace group!

[smirkymonkey]

19. It sounds like you had such an idyllic childhood!

Of course, most of us who grew up in beautiful upstate NY did, becuse it was the perfect place to grow up, but your childhood w/ the horses and the old victrola ,and Thomas Edison records! *swoon*

[Rhiannon12866]

21. There was a problem with the victrola

Some kids broke into her barn (to smoke?!) and broke some of those irreeplaceale old records. So I suggested to my grandmother that she give it to my brother who had quite a record collection at the time. And I have lived to regret that, since he has it now, covered up with knick-knacks on top and nobody is enjoying those records anymore. They were vintage WWI, I think. I still remember some of the words. From "Barney Google with the Goo Goo Googly Eyes:"

"How is a flapper like a bungalow?

She's painted in front, shingled in back - and she has no attic!"

[smirkymonkey]

22. I love those old songs!

I still listen to them on YouTube. They were so much fun and so uplifting! I sometimes think I was born too late!

[Rhiannon12866]

25. That's a good point! I wonder if that one's on YouTube? We kids liked the funny ones!

Found it, but it appears to be missing the funny bit I remember:

[brewens]

6. Bass, corned beef, various berries and tomatoes. I get two or three corned beef briskets

before St. Patrick's Day. Lately I et most of those making reuben wraps.

I worked at a Skippers in the early 80's and can do up a batch of awesome deep fried bass fillets. I hold that down to once a year these days.

[smirkymonkey]

13. Bass - Do you fish or do you buy it?

Is it sea bass? I love that too! Berries and tomatoes are great as well. I think of corned beef as more of an early spring food, but I guess if you stock up like that it would last you a long time. You could even use it on salads! I love Ruebens!

Sounds delicious!

[brewens]

15. I live about two miles from some good small mouthed bass fishing in Idaho. I usually

go after them hard right when it cools down at the end of the summer, but with all the smoke every year now, it's hard to find good days to go.

[smirkymonkey]

17. There is nothing better than freshly caught fish.

I grew up in way upstate NY and we used to catch trout and perch mostly, which was delicious. I'm sorry you are having problems with all the smoke. Did you guys get hit with the heat wave as well or did it miss you?

[alwaysinasnit]

7. Cherries!!!

[smirkymonkey]

14. Yes!

They are so delicious! Summer fruit is wonderful. I like to add it to savory salads sometimes w/ nuts and cheese in the summer.

[alwaysinasnit]

23. Stop, you're making me salivate!

[Hoyt]

9. I immediately thought of watermelon too, especially the ones my grandad picked.

Blackberries that my grandma picked.

A fresh trout from a remote river.

[smirkymonkey]

16. I think watermelon is one of my favorite foods.

I love anything watery (w-melon, cukes, lettuces, etc.) and i am one of those constantly thirsty people. Fresh picked blackberries sound great - we used to find those growing wild as well.

Trout is also delicious! It was big where I grew up in upstate NY, but I don't really see it here in Eastern MA much. I do really like it though. It's also great smoked.

[electric_blue68]

20. Ah... fun. So I have...

yes, corn on the cob. Even raw taken home (rinsed)
right from the Green market. 😁
If steamed, or quickly boiled, add butter, and sometimes chilli powder.


*Local heirloom tomatoes*. 🥰 Oh, swoon! giggle I live for this each summer. ) (I do get heirlooms from Traders, but GM is best).
•In a provelone, mayo, garlic powder sandwich.
•A extra sharp cheddar cheese, mayo, garlic powder 'wich.
•Salad - romaine, feta, finely sliced red onions, walnuts, a bit of extra virgin olive oil.

Local red, yellow, orange peppers. In salad.

Peaches, nectarines, aprocots, champagne grapes (teeny grapes 🥰 , short season - ?Aug).

yippie! 😁

[electric_blue68]

24. Turns out I don't eat green grapes anymore. Red w or w/o...

seeds.

At some point ? in my late 40's, 50's; noticed my mouth, lips would get dry after eating them (since I was a kid).
I thought it was residual pesticides.

Turns out green grapes have some chemical that has a drying effect as a protective mechanism!
I guess eating them for decades it kicked in.

[Xolodno]

26. Rainier Cherries.

...followed by peaches and watermelon.

[Laffy Kat]

28. Fruit, especially melons. Yum. nt

[happybird]

29. Watermelon (Sugar Baby, specifically) and Cantaloupe

Maryland Blue Crabs

[MFM008]

30. Im done with summer

after 3 days 100 degrees plus here in WA.
I want pumpkin stuff.....

[Buckeye_Democrat]

31. Cantaloupes.

Grown locally and delicious!

[dameatball]

32. I made that cucumber salad Sunday except I added a little green pepper. Had blueberries and shredded

wheat for breakfast. Tonight, grilling flank steak, corn and pineapple. I need to get a watermelon but I just get the small ones unless the grandkids happen to be around.

[smirkymonkey]

34. Cucumbers are perfect for summer.

They are so refreshing! Your dinner sounds great!

I also love Tzatziki (Greek cucumber, yogurt, dill sauce, sometimes w/ mint) over grilled meats or on salads. I use it as a dressing sometimes.

Mediterranean food is ideal for summer!

[SamKnause]

33. Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes !!!

[smirkymonkey]

35. Yes! My favorite!

Garden tomatoes, heirloom, organic. They are so delicious!

One of my favorite seasonal lunches is to take a really good loaf of crusty French or Italian bread and cut it into sections, then cut it lenghtwise so that there is crust on the bottom of each section.

Then place slices of fresh mozzarella cheese on the sections of bread and put it in the toaster oven just enough to toast the bread and soften the cheese.

When you take it out of the toaster oven, drizzle a little EV Olive Oil on the cheese and then put a few slices of fresh garden or organic tomatoes on top of the mozzarella and salt & pepper to taste. Sprinkle with a little fresh basil chiffonade.

It's so simple, but such a perfect summer meal!

[Nay]

36. Rainier cherries, salmon just pulled out of a BC river, Montana huckleberry ice cream,

rhubarb pie, sweet corn, Hanover tomatoes from VA.

[smirkymonkey]

37. Sounds like a perfect summer meal!

Now I'm getting hungry!