Braised Cucumbers

Ever since i saw the movie “Julie and Julia” I have been intrigued by the idea of braised cucumbers. Well I finally got up the nerve to make them and let me tell you… THE ROCK!!!!!

The original recipe I found called for mint but I didn’t have any so I used some marjoram from the garden and wow it was awesome.

 

Here is the recipe I came up with…

 

4 cucumbers peeled, seeded and cut into spears

1/4 cup butter

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tap fresh cracked black pepper

1/2 tsp fresh lemon zest

5 to 8 marjoram leaves, chopped

 

Melt the butter in a skillet and toss in the cucumbers. Sauté until they turn slightly browned all over. Add salt, pepper and lemon zest. Continue to cook for a few more minutes. Take off heat and stir in marjoram.

 

 

I love trying new recipes. I hope you like this one!!

Preserving Basil

I went a “tad” crazy planting basil this year. This is a bed of basil in my

yard. I have another one I didn’t take a picture of.  I think there are 10 plants here. I had another 8 plants in that other bed.

I have enjoyed very much having fresh basil in the garden to run out and pick whenever I wanted. When the basil started to bloom it was time to pick it all. I ended up with about 5 pounds of basil!

 

 

It smelled amazing in our house. But picking all the leaves from the stems took FOREVER!!!

 

In this picture you can see all of the basil leaves in the basket. I was pretty excited and slightly overwhelmed on what to do with all that basil. The first thing that popped in my head was pesto! So I made 3 kinds!!!

 

This one is Almond Lemon Basil Pesto. It’s pretty much amazing. I bet you want the recipe, huh? I found it here.

I also froze some. I took some basil and chopped it up and stuffed it in ice cube trays, filled it with water and froze it. When the ice cubes were done I tossed them in a zip top bag and now whenever I make a soup I can toss in an ice cube of basil!

 

The last of the basil I dried in the dehydrator. The garage smelled amazing!

 

I also decided to try to save the seeds. We let a few plants go to seed and hung up the seed pods to dry to hopefully save the seeds for next years garden.

 

I hope you have found some interesting ideas on how to keep the flavors of summer with you all winter long.

Roasted Veggie Pizza

So tonight for dinner I made this amazing pizza and I thought I would share with you how I put it together.

 First I sliced up onions, tomatoes, and zucchini. I spritzed them with a little olive oil and hit them with some salt and pepper. I stuck them in a hot oven (425) for 10 minutes, flipped them and baked them for another 10 minutes. I made my roll recipe and rolled half of the dough into a pizza crust. the other half I used to make cinnamon rolls for dessert!!
For the sauce I used Hunts brand chunky veggie pasta sauce. I love it! It has carrots, onions, celery, and zucchini in it along with the tomato sauce. I put all  the toppings on with some mozzarella cheese (except for 1/4 we left cheese less for Bella [dairy allergy]) baked in a 400 oven for 20 minutes. It was pretty much amazing! I love this pizza! Not only is it super good for you with all the veggies but the roasted veggies have some awesome flavor. I have found if you pre cook them your pizza won't get soggy.

Also I have to give a shout out to my awesome hubby who works so hard in the garden. The tomatoes, zucchini, onions, and basil (which was added after I took the picture, sorry) all came from our garden!! I hope the next time you have family pizza night you take a few minutes to roast up a few veggies to top it with. Trust me it's worth it!!