Try Asparagus Salmon Salad for a serving of health in a bowl

A recipe that's literally health in a bowl--Asparagus Salmon Salad.

I picked up the recipe from a cookbook called Simply Colorado--one time when I was visiting in that great state of Colorado. The line of recommendation that appeared under the title read, "Attractive salad that's ready in minutes."

All that is true. It assembles lightning quick--a good mini-meal to put together, for example, when you get home from Sunday church and want to get food on the table quickly. With both vegetables and the fish in the salad, you really don't need to serve it alongside anything else, since it works as an entree. (We did, however, heat up some Renie's Cheesy Potatoes--in a few days I'll be sharing the recipe for that good dish.)

What I failed to say was that the salad, when assembled, looks and tastes as though it is something you might be served in a fancy, upsale restaurant.

To the basic ingredients I added a sprinkling of Swiss cheese on top. With just me and Hubby under our roof, Asparagus Salmon Salad lasted for two dinners and a lunch.

In it we got our quota of salmon, spinach, and tomatoes--those oft-touted power foods--for the week, so I felt virtuous, plus the dish is so colorful and attractive, I felt as though I was a master chef--all over an entree that can be put together in under 20 minutes from start to finish.

Asparagus Salmon Salad

1 tablespoon olive oil

1/2 cup rice vinegar

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

1/4 teaspoon dried whole thyme

1/4 teaspoon salt (we use salt substitute)

3/4 pound fresh or frozen whole asparagus

1 can (6 3/4 ounces) salmon, drained and flaked, or leftover salmon (I baked a fresh salmon filet in the oven for about 15 minutes to use as my salmon ingredient)

spinach leaves

2 tomatoes, cut in wedges

freshly ground pepper

shredded Swiss cheese

In a jar combine oil, vinegar, mustard, thyme, and salt; shake vigorously. Chill. Steam asparagus until tender (about 3-5 minutes); cool. Line salad plates with lettuce leaves. Arrange asparagus spears, salmon, and tomato wedges on lettuce. Drizzle dressing over top; season with pepper. Sprinkle shredded Swiss cheese on top. Chill until ready to serve.

Kid-friendly sloppy joe mix helps sneak veggies past the unsuspecting

OK, here it is, friends--the recipe I've been mentioning for the past several blogs. Wonderful- tasting, quick, ample--and best of all, a way to sneak veggies down the unsuspecting (aka, kids).

The recipe for Cabbage Sloppy Joes was like so many of the others--discovered in desperation when Hubby, a few years back, brought in from our garden more heads of cabbage than we could even get our minds around.

I began hunting (yes, Internet searches help immensely at such times) for offbeat uses for this bounty. That's when I found the instructions for cooking Cabbage Sloppy Joes. Whoever would have thought? The author of the recipe mentioned that the cabbage gave the mixture a slightly sweet taste and of course made it more full-bodied than was the average means of preparing sloppy joes, to be served over buns.

The addition of brown sugar, ketchup, lemon juice, and mustard make a nice sauce to wind around the browned ground turkey and tender cabbage. Other than chopping and shredding the cabbage, enough to make 1 1/2 cups, you can make quick work of this on-the-table-fast dish. Earlier this week a friend was on hand to help me get this recipe pulled together (I'm cooking and freezing some meals to take to our little expectant couple when they bring our grandson into the world later this month; my friend was helping me with this assembly-line enterprise.) She was absolutely incredulous at how quick this meal materialized. I knew she also was thinking the same thing that drew me to Cabbage Sloppy Joes--this is something her kids might like.

Every summer at cabbage time, I always start salivating for Cabbage Sloppy Joes (recipe also found in my new cookbook, Way Back in the Country Garden) and know that they are only a few days around the corner. Throw a few carrot sticks and a few grapes on the plate, and it's a summertime, don't-have-to-heat-up the kitchen meal that will stick in your memory for a long time.

Cabbage Sloppy Joes

1 pound ground beef or ground turkey

1 1/2 cups finely shredded cabbage

1 medium onion, chopped

1 celery rib, chopped

1/4 cup chopped green pepper

1 cup ketchup (we use the no-salt variety)

3 tablespoons brown sugar

2 tablespoons lemon juice

1 tablespoon vinegar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon prepared mustard

1 teaspoon salt (we use salt substitute)

dash pepper

8 buns, split

In large skillet cook the ground beef (or turkey), shredded cabbage, onion, celery, and green pepper over medium heat until meat no longer is pink and vegetables are crisp-tender. Drain. Stir in the ketchup, brown sugar, lemon juice, vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, salt, and pepper. Cover and simmer for 10 minutes or until cabbage is tender. Spoon 1/2 cup onto each roll. Makes 8 servings.

Too many recipes left at the end of the fruit supply? Roadside produce stands are the answer

The old saying, "Why do I have so much month left at the end of the money?", could be applied to where we are season-wise right now.

I'm thinking (and mourning), "Why do I have so many peach recipes left at the end of my summer?"

The peaches long ago left our trees; the branches, though still green and leafy, are sadly bare of fruit and will remain that way until next June.

And yet my recipe file still brims with untried recipes that didn't get brought to life before the peach crop faded away. One of those was an all-time winner, "Peach-Blueberry Pie", which combines two of my favorite fruit in all the world. It appears in my new cookbook, Way Back in the Country Garden, but truthfully, I don't think I prepared it all last summer or maybe even the summer before. It's the absolute greatest, but yet another year was breezing by without it materializing.

Enter Ham's Orchard. Until a few weeks ago I probably was the only North Texan alive who didn't know about this fun little spot, just east of Terrell off Highway 80. A combination roadside market/fudgery/burger stand, Ham's is best-known for its many varieties of peaches produced from the massive orchard adjacent to the indoor produce stop. A few weeks beforehand my daughter and her husband had been introduced to Ham's and had suggested we take a Sunday-afternoon drive to tour it as well. I knew Ham's would have to be special to entice my daughter, who is very great with a child (did I say very?) and desperately seeks to avoid crowds, to brave Ham's crowded aisles to show us this haven of goodies.

Perhaps Ham's best draws are the fresh homemade peach ice cream and peach shakes that are wildly popular with customers, especially on extremely hot Texas summer afternoons. Other delicacies are the homemade peach cobblers and ready-prepared meals that are sold ready to be popped into the oven. On the Sunday afternoon we stopped in, customers swarmed around like bees after honey. I saw my opportunity to replenish my peach supply and give life to my "Peach-Blueberry Pie" after all.

With a small sack of some of Ham's finest tucked under my arm, I resisted the temptation for a soft-serve peach ice cream cone and instead envisioned my upcoming pie that soon would have intermingled morsels of peaches and blueberries bubbling through the squares in the lattice-topped crust. (I had a bag of blueberries left from an earlier visit to the Chickasaw Nation farmer's market, so now with the peaches I was in business.)

Happily, that dream was soon realized. Nobody we saw departing Ham's slurping peach shakes or licking peach cones on that Sunday afternoon had anything near the smiles on our faces that resulted from the first bite of my upcoming warm homemade Peach-Blueberry Pie.

Yay! I didn't have to wait another year to enjoy it after all.

Peach-Blueberry Pie

1 cup sugar (I use sugar substitute)

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon ground allspice

3 cups sliced peeled fresh peaches

1 cup fresh blueberries

1 tablespoon butter (I use unsalted, not margarine)

pastry for double-crust pie (9 inches)

milk (I use skim milk)

cinnamon

a "little" extra sugar to mix with the cinnamon

In a bowl combine sugar, flour, cinnamon, and allspice. Add the peaches and blueberries; toss gently. Line pie plate with bottom crust; add the filling. Dot with butter. Top with a lattice crust. Brush crust with milk; sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Bake at 400 degrees for 40-45 minutes or until crust is golden brown and filing is bubbly. Cool completely. Frozen fruit may be used if it is thawed and well-drained. Serves 6-8.

"Oui oui!" to French Cabbage, a most unusual but flavorful use of this summer veggie

I've never known what was French about it, but the French Cabbage recipe featured here is one to which we definitely say "Oui! Oui!"

I turned it up a few years back when our garden produced row after row of cabbage. I was desperate to find recipes that would incorporate the vegetable beyond the basic "boiled cabbage on the stovetop" routine.

Enter the Birchman cookbook, or as members of my family would teasingly mock me, "The Birch-man Cook-book", repeated in a singsong fashion. They did this because seemingly every dish I put on the table, for months and months on end, had its origin in this outstanding church cookbook that included one of the best recipe collections I've ever run across in a cookbook that was not commercially produced.

As, working my way through the cookbook I prepared the recipes, compliments abounded from those I served. "The Birch-man Cook-book", I'd reply to make sure proper credit was due. Pretty soon my family members turned this into a tease. "The Birch-man Cook-book," they'd reply. Thank you, Birchman Baptist Church in Fort Worth, for being a goldmine of excellent recipes then and now.

One of those, of course, was this one for French Cabbage. Our cabbage rows definitely weren't as prolific this year as they were in the one when we first began preparing this recipe, but I had several heads left in my refrigerator. (The final one went for Cabbage Sloppy Joes, which I'll feature in an upcoming blog.)

This makes a great, unusual, and colorful combination for a bring-a-dish buffet or potluck. People will be blown away when you tell them that cabbage is the main ingredient.

French Cabbage

1 medium cabbage

1 to 2 small bell peppers, chopped

3 to 4 cloves garlic, chopped

1 tablespoon butter

3/4 cup celery, chopped fine

1 cup whole milk (can use skim)

1 cup grated Cheddar cheese

salt and pepper to taste

toasted bread crumbs

Quarter cabbage and cook in small amount of water until tender; drain and chop fine. Cook celery, peppers, and garlic in butter until tender. Add to cabbage. Pour in cream and grated cheese. Mix well and place in a 9-by-9-inch dish. Put bread crumbs on top. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

Cucumbers and Onions in Vinegar: the Grand Pooh-Bah of Summer Foods

When I was making my list of summer "must-haves" before waning August days try to steal our joy, I neglected the Grand Pooh-Bah of Summer Foods: Cucumbers and Onions in Vinegar.

Something about that tangy, always-makes-you-sneeze, vinegar and water combination that the cukes and onions soak in to give them their flavor bespeaks of a scorcher summer day.

Cucumbers and Onions (some people throw in a chopped-up tomato for a little color and taste alternative) couldn't be simpler to prepare, yet until now, when I'm my making list and checking it twice about what not to neglect before summer draws to a close, it hadn't occurred to me--we hadn't indulged in this one yet.

How could I overlook it, since it bears a place of honor in my new cookbook, Way Back in the Country Garden? It's a featured recipe as I describe my cousin Lynda's surprise wedding to her prince, George, and the memorable barbecue meal that followed.

Our cousins Bill and Jana brought Cucumbers and Onions fresh from their garden to serve at the lunch, which featured Mesquite Barbecue from the popular Mesquite eatery that our Uncle Herbert founded and where he became legendary for his Oyler Pit. (The recipe below can be attributed to Bill and Jana.)

It was a perfect complement for that barbecue, although last night at dinner it also went wonderfully well when Hubby and I dined on Cabbage Sloppy Joes (in a future blog I'll write more about that splendid recipe.) And yes, as if to pronounce Cucumbers and Onions in Vinegar a hit, Hubby graced it with a big sneeze as the pepper and the eau de tangy brine tickled his nostrils.

Hubby is bummed that our cucumber supply, despite all the vast, leafy vines that covered a portion of the garden, wasn't voluminous this year. It's on his 2011 Garden Resolutions list for next summer--a better cucumber patch.

But the few we have remaining we plan to enjoy down to the last tiny morsel floating in the vinegar-and-water sea. Summer, last just a little longer so we can enjoy all your good foods.

Cucumbers and Vinegar in Oil

2-3 medium cucumbers

1 medium onion

1/2 cup vinegar

1/2 cup water

1 teaspoon salt(we use salt substitute)

pepper to taste (the more you can stand, the better)

Peel cucumbers and slice horizontally. Slice onions crosswise. Put cucumbers and onions in a bowl. Pour vinegar and water over them. Stir to mix. Chill several hours before you serve. Serves 6-8.

Zucchini adds the magic touch to keep this Chicken Tortilla Soup from being ho-hum boring

As everyone knows, Chicken Tortilla Soup recipes are a dime a dozen. Most people have a favorite; most recipes follow a certain predictable pattern of ingredients.

Except this one--it had sliced, fresh zucchini added! Now, how Newfangled Country Gardener-ish can you get? Zucchini, to go with all the other fresh vegetables in this mixture--fresh corn off the cob, fresh tomatoes, cilantro. It sounded as though it would an extremely healthy rendition of an old favorite.

Thank you, Fry's'. (Fry's is not the electronics store but is the Arizona version of our Kroger grocery. When we're in AZ visiting our little family there, we're devoted Fry's shoppers, so we get on the mailing list for the Fry's circular just as we do the Kroger one. (By the way, Fry's and Kroger's are owned by the same parent corporation.) The Fry's circular featured this Chicken Tortilla Soup recipe.)

Talk about a dish that got healthier the longer it stuck around. The first night we served it, I just scattered a dash of cheddar cheese on top. The next day for lunch (I'm telling ya, this recipe made enough for two armies) I topped it with a little dash of sour cream. That night for dinner (this soup was so good, we never tired of leftovers; Hubby tolerated it for both lunch and dinner in the same day) I chopped up some fresh avocado and touched it up with a little more fresh tomato for garnish over all the other items. A meal in one, for sure!

Five meals later (no joke!) today at lunch I think Hubby and I will be polishing off the last morsel of this flavorful, healthy soup. I think the zucchini added the magic touch and kept it from being boring and left-overy. And best of all, it gives us just one more boost in the 5-to-9 fruit-and-vegetables category that we're supposed to have every day.

Never toss out that grocery-store circular without looking over the featured recipes. You might just find a gold mine like we did--probably the best chicken-tortilla soup ever!

Chicken Tortilla Soup

1 teaspoon olive oil

2 zucchini, cut into cubes

1 can (29-ounces) crushed tomatoes (or 2 1/2 cups fresh tomatoes, sliced in chunks)

6 cups chicken broth

1 cup fresh corn, cut off the cob

1 1/2 teaspoons cumin

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 boneless chicken breasts, cooked and shredded

1 bunch fresh cilantro, chopped

optional toppings: sliced avocados, tortilla chips, shredded cheddar cheese, fresh limes, sour cream, chopped fresh tomatoes (any or all will do)

In a stockpot heat the oil. Add zucchini and saute for 2 minutes. Add the crushed tomatoes, chicken broth, corn, cumin, cayenne pepper, and shredded chicken. Heat to a boil. Turn down the heat and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes. Stir in a handful of chopped cilantro just before serving. To serve place a handful of tortilla chips in the bottom of a soup bowl. Ladle hot soup over the tortilla chips. Add a generous squeeze of lime and top with avocado, cheese, cilantro, tomatoes, and sour cream, if desired. Refrigerate any leftovers. Serves 4 to 6.

Summer can't get away from us without peach homemade ice cream

August has arrived--for us, that's good tidings of great joy. It's BABY MONTH. In just a few weeks our new little grandperson is expected. August no longer is some far-off destination trimesters away or even "next month". It's here! The days are ticking by. Soon we'll be meeting him. Yay!!

But as August and Grandboy's due-date roll around, so do the drill-team members and cheerleaders who start returning to the high-school next door to attend their get-ready practices for fall.

Every retailer from Lands'End to Walmart parades out its back-to-school wares. Sunny days are just a tad shorter. Before we blink an eye, we'll have run out of summer and be escorting in autumn.

So, on my summer "must-do" checklist, what's lacking? What have I not cooked that represents absolute the best of summer's essence?

No-brainer: HOMEMADE ICE CREAM! That freezer has not been off the shelf this year; the rock-salt box is undisturbed from the last time we made ice cream last year (or was it two summers ago? Horrors.)

And what did I have staring me right in the face? An unadulterated summer weekend--in fact, the hottest one so far, with temps in the triple digits and not a raincloud to dot the summer sky.

In the refrigerator I just happened to have a bowl full of peeled, chopped peaches--the last vestige of those from our garden's peach trees. Clearly the choice of how to use this supply already was made--homemade peach ice cream.

Oh, and did we love it, down to the very last peach morsel! My recipe, straight out of my new cookbook, Way Back in the Country Garden, was different from our tried-and-true one that we've used since early marriage. That one, though it had served us well for years and years, featured eggs as an ingredient; as anyone knows, uncooked eggs in recipes are big no-no's now, because of health fears over raw eggs. We've all had to dig a little deeper to find eggless or cooked custard-like ice-cream recipes that are suitable.

As I began pouring my peach mixture into the ice-cream-freezer canister, Hubby raised the usual skeptical eyebrow. "Nothing will happen with that," he scowled. "You have to add lots of whole milk. You don't have enough liquid in there. This isn't the way it works at all." I assured him that from the peach puree, enough liquid would materialize--trust me!

Through the entire freezing process, he paced around doubtfully. "This isn't going to work," he growled. (You have to understand that hubby LIVES to eat ice cream. The thought of something going afoul in ice-cream production was like the prospect of finding no goodies in the stockings on Christmas morning.)

Many churns of the electric ice-cream maker later, the moment of truth was now. With the dasher pulled out, the result was . . . beautiful, thick, peach-laced homemade ice cream! The peach puree indeed had saved the day. We could enjoy a record-setting high temp on a blistering August day with the best summertime dish around--Fresh Peach Homemade Ice Cream.

And for some odd reason when the fresh, frozen ice cream was scooped into bowls and eaten on the deck it didn't melt in the hot weather as fast as homemade ice cream usually does. Maybe it was the peach puree. Who knows?

August, nanny-nanny-boo-boo on you. You may be trying to sneak fall in on us, but with delicious bites of peach ice cream sliding past my taste buds, summer is here forever.

Fresh Peach Homemade Ice Cream

6 medium peaches (about 2 pounds), peeled and

stoned, or 4 cups frozen unsweetened peach slices,

thawed

1 cup sugar

3 cups heavy cream

1 cup whole milk

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

In a large bowl mash the peaches into a coarse puree. Stir in 1/4 cup of the sugar. Let mixture stand for 1 hour. To the peach mixture add the cream, milk, remaining 3/4 cup sugar, and vanilla. Stir to blend. Refrigerate, covered, until the mixture is very cold, at least 3 hours or as long as 3 days (the colder, the better--but at this point don't put in the freezing compartment of the refrigerator!) Stir the mixture to blend and pour into the canister of an ice-cream maker. Freeze according to the manufacturer’s directions. Eat at once or transfer to a covered container and freeze up to 8 hours. Makes about 1 1/2 quarts of ice cream.