What's On Our Table

What our family eats varies with the seasons. Here’s a look at some of the food gracing our table during this  summertime season in Washington state.

Grilled Portobello Burgers
I followed the cooking method listed here, but topped the burgers with caramelized onions and Havarti.

Breakfast Cake 
My mom started a tradition of making we kids coffee cake for our birthday breakfast, but to make it seem even more special she called it “breakfast cake.” I loved it as a kid because it meant I was getting two cakes on one day! The tradition continues with my kids and this year my son chose a peach mango filling for his breakfast cake.

Sweet Spring Salad 
I planted a new type of lettuce in our backyard garden called “Corn Salad” and it was one of the first things I was able to harvest this Spring. When I tasted it I found out it was a bitter green, so I combined it with sweet strawberries, corn, basil, cotija cheese and a raspberry walnut dressing to create a fresh spring salad.

Tilapia Tacos with Chipotle Slaw 
Fish tacos are one of my daughter’s favorite meals and I try to make it once a month during the warm summer months. This time we enjoyed our fish tacos with the season’s first pickings of snow peas.

Local Strawberries on Cold Overnight Oatmeal
(Our summertime breakfast favorite) I took my kids to a strawberry patch in our area and we picked enough fresh berries that we kept a big bowl of fresh snacking berries on the counter for the next three days and made two gallons of strawberry freezer jam. One of my favorite things about strawberry freezer jam is that it maintains the juicy perfection of a ripe strawberry for months to come.

Spicy Grilled Fish on Rice and Peas with Dill (Masaledar Macchi) 
This delicious recipe from Madhur Jaffrey’s book Quick & Easy Indian Cooking not only increased my familiarity with cooking Indian food, but also helped meet my New Year’s goal of learning more ways to prepare trout.