What's For Dinner? Week 2

I need to start off this post with an apology... 

For my blog's inadequate search ability. 

(The first step is admitting you have a problem, right?)

I've had several people tell me recently that they couldn't find a recipe they were looking for on my blog and asking if I could just give it to them.  Gah!  I feel terrible for making you waste your valuable time just for a silly recipe.  But I'm just not good at this stuff!  When I started this blog, it was really just intended to be a family photo journal.  I had no idea I'd start a post series (let alone many) and really haven't a clue how to set my blog up for you to search and quickly find a recipe.  Even I have to try to remember where I posted what so I don't have to keep retyping the recipe.  :(

When someone suggested labels for my posts, I painstakingly took the time to go back and label everything.  Ugh.  And then I added a search bar, which seems completely nonfunctional in my opinion.  Well, now those systems are in place and it's still not easy to find a specific recipe - only the series of posts.  I really don't want this to be exclusively a food blog - it's still just a journal and I'm still just journaling what I cook - so I don't really need/want a super detailed side bar to breakdown food categories.  But maybe some kind of favorite recipes tab or something relatively simple?  If any of you far-more-computer-literate peeps have any suggestions, I'm open to them!  But they have to be fairly easy! 

Again, sorry for any inconveniences.  :(

{Week of August 4-10}

Vegetable bag #10 (halfway through the regular season!), picked up on July 31st:

Contents (post trading):  beets, 2 bunch of kale, plum tomatoes, sweet banana pepper, yellow squash, cucumber, zucchini, 2 onions, 1 large heirloom tomato and a "lemon cucumber" (the small thing next to the large tomato - it just tasted like a regular cucumber).

Also pictured above:  the cantaloupe in the top right corner - our fruit share this week.

Saturday morning breakfast:  Weelicious whole wheat waffles (Will's request).

Awesome new dinner recipe this week:  steak and veggie kabobs with avocado dipping sauce.  Loved it!!!  Will definitely be repeating.

Soph loved it too!  Nobody cared for the yellow squash but me... weirdos.  And Craig and Will only tried the sauce and ate the kabobs without.  But in general, it was a hit!

Remember the roasted eggplant sandwiches I mentioned?  You MUST try them!  Even if you don't like eggplant.  'Cause really, it's not my favorite either.  I have exactly one other recipe (okay, two) that I can tolerate eggplant in.  But generally, I've been trading it when it comes in my bag.  Not anymore though!  These are so easy and so delicious.  But beware!  You WILL have garlic breath.  Don't say you weren't warned!

This veggie pesto pizza is another one of those that I have to go back and dig up the post I wrote out the recipe in.  Grr!  But the green bean salad is an easy linker-upper.  I make both of these recipes so often during the summer.  The salad is my favorite way to serve beans in the summer.  (In winter, I like them sauteed with bacon and tomato in a warm and cozy recipe.)  And the pizza is such a versatile recipe that's good for any summer veggie you want to use up.  You can find the pesto recipe here and then I just put it on my own homemade crust and top with sliced tomato, red onion, broccoli pieces, and banana peppers and then sprinkle with Parm and mozzarella and bake at 400 for ~25 minutes.  I make a batch of pesto every time we get a bunch of basil in our bag.  So I've made and froze three batches so far this summer.  Love it!

Heaven on a plate... made even better with a glass of moscato and a glass of water.  P.S. - have I mentioned that we are permanently using cloth napkins at all meals?  More on that later.

I recently bought a book all about packing school lunch (I'm totally hyped on that again) and found that the recipes in it will probably be used as much or more for ME than the kids!  But I love the book and will highly recommend it to you... in another post.  Here is one of the awesome salads I found.  Do you like edamame?  It's a legume.  Basically a soy bean.  Great source of protein and fiber.  I love finding different ways to serve it and this was so easy and tasty! 

Just mix equal parts cooked corn kernels (I just shaved them off the cob since we've been getting so much corn), cooked, shelled edamame (you can get this in the frozen section of your local grocery store), halved cherry tomatoes, and avocado cubes.  I think I used about a cup and a half of each.  Then you combine two parts lime juice to one part olive oil.  I just eyeballed it and added more as needed.  Toss together and sprinkle with cilantro if you wish.  I did wish... but I didn't have any so mine was lacking.  :(  Also season with salt and pepper.  You could do this whole salad in a container with a tight fitting lid and let the kiddies shake it up for you!  Might encourage them to try it more easily.

We had steak on the grill (again) with slices of our CSA focaccia and some more veggies and we ate outside on this incredibly beautiful, perfect-temperature evening.

Thursday night, I made red beet pancakes for the kids dinner and sent more to my mom for their breakfast the next morning.  They LOVE those!  After bathing the kids and dropping them off at my mom's that evening, Craig and I went shopping for a tennis racket for me and then picked up Vito's pizza for a late dinner while watching the Olympics.  ;-)