g's little kitchen: Fun with summer produce

Summer is allowing me to experiment with veggies and I have been having so much fun doing so. Our new town has a wonderful farmer’s market each Thursday. The produce is beautiful. Even though it’s not always cheaper to buy my veggies at the farmer’s market, I can sometimes find a really great deal. I am also more than willing to spend a few extra dollars on super fresh local produce! Eat local right?

I love bringing little one with me so that he can meet the farmers who are growing the food we are eating. We were really lucky last year to be able to purchase our veggies through an AMAZING CSA. Little one took a trip out to the farm last year and had a blast! I fed him tons of veggies from the farm as his first foods and now he isn’t a very picky eater. That is to say, he’s willing to try anything I put in front of him. He’s not always a big fan but he’s always willing to try. Since we moved so early in the summer we weren’t able to sign up with a CSA here in MN but I am looking for one for next year.

What I have to share today isn’t anything ground breaking but it is very yummy! Most recipes I find that include veggies talk about slipping veggies sneakily into foods. I do have a copy of Deceptively Delicious in my cookbook collection and I’m fine with camouflaging veggies. However, if I can make it obvious to little one that veggies can be yummy I would prefer to do that. The two veggies that I have found some fun new ways to eat are zucchini and cucumber. These aren’t recipes, just ideas on how to use a few veggies you may have in the garden or fridge.

Enjoy!

This summer I have turned zucchini into pizza crust. Nothing fancy like the cauliflower pizza crust I made. I cut a good size zucchini on a bias into discs and topped it with sauce and cheese. Next I pop the mini zucchini pizzas into a 350 oven for about 15-20 minutes. Pair these mini pizzas with a salad and you have a veggie feast! Any red sauce would work well. I used salsa all’amatriciana and goodness was it yummy!

The cucumbers made the cutest little cups for chicken salad. We normally have chicken salad on crackers or bread so pairing the salad with cucumbers was fun. I cut the cucumber into thick discs (I would cut them a little less thick next time) and used a cookie scoop (hard to believe but I don’t have a melon baller) and scooped out the insides to make cups. I made a chicken salad out of odds and ends in the fridge and divided it in between the cups. I didn’t want to toss the insides of the cucumber so I put them in a big pitcher of water. Oh so good!