Zucchini, Corn, and Bean Sauté

Fresh tomatoes brighten this vegan meatless Monday delight

Fresh local produce! It’s super abundant in our markets right now. So we’re using it any way we can.

In this easy sauté, for instance. Squash, sweet corn, and beans are a traditional American combo, dating back long before European settlement. We added tomatoes for extra color and zing.

Because it don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that zing.

Roast White Beans and Eggplant with Tomato

We use corona beans in this terrific main/side – but any white bean will work

Nothing brings out savor like roasting. Today we’re applying its magic to white beans and eggplant. With some spicy tomato sauce to liven things up.

We like to serve this dish as a main course (if you go that route, you might also want to add a salad and/or some crusty bread). But it also makes an excellent side dish.

However you serve it, we suggest adding a glass of wine. Just so you can offer a proper toast: Buon appetito!

Italian Sausage and Grapes with Pasta

Savory, sweet, and spicy – and quick enough for weeknight dinner

Sweet grapes paired with savory sausage? Yup, it’s a classic.

This Italian dish is most often served as a simple sauté flavored with balsamic vinegar and sometimes garlic. But we like to combine it with pasta for an easy main course.

With a glass of wine, of course. Because grapes.

Mediterranean-Style Okra and Tomatoes

Adding white beans to this classic braised dish makes for a quick main course

How about a Mediterranean holiday? Virtual, of course.

This Mediterranean-Style Okra and Tomatoes dish features garlic, thyme, and fresh basil. It’s basically a quick braise. Adding white beans makes it a complete vegetarian meal, perfect for weeknight dinner.

So we can’t travel to the Mediterranean? No worries. The flavors can still travel to our kitchens.

Summer White Bean and Vegetable Stir-Fry

A Mediterranean one-skillet dinner that’s quick, easy, and healthy

We’re enjoying summer’s bounty of vegetables and herbs in our part of the world. But the weather is unremittingly hot, so we don’t want to spend much time cooking.

Fortunately, we have stir-fry. It’s a quick and easy way to showcase almost any vegetable you can think of.

This dish takes only about 20 minutes total for prep and cooking. Stress-free weeknight dinner, anyone?

Italian Pork Ragu for Pasta or Polenta

Think of this as Italian Pulled Pork

Cooler weather has arrived in our part of the world, so we’re looking for heartier fare. Like this luscious meat ragu.

In Italian, “ragù” refers to a meat-based sauce. In the US, we mostly use beef for Italian Pasta Sauce. But pork makes a tasty change.

Serve this ragu by tossing it with pasta or ladling it over creamy soft polenta. But be sure to wear ear protection when you dish this up. Because once your guests taste it, their cheers will be deafening.

Pasta Caprese

A great way to celebrate peak tomato (and basil) season

It’s been summer for a while here in North America. Which means our veggie gardens are overflowing with ripe tomatoes and knee-high basil. And every farmers’ market has mounds of both. So now is the perfect time to enjoy the classic pairing of these two warm-weather favorites.

If you add fresh mozzarella to the mix—taking an already wonderful flavor combination to an even higher level—you have the makings for Caprese salad. We eat a lot of that at our house, but sometimes we want something more substantial. Something that can also serve as a one-dish meal. Then we opt for Pasta Caprese—which is really just Caprese salad with a pasta base.

Pasta Caprese serves up healthy flavor that almost everyone likes—kids included. It’s also an easy-to-make recipe that can be ready in minutes. You won’t spend much time in the kitchen preparing this beauty. Which means you’ll have more time to enjoy all that summer sunshine.

Soupe au Pistou

Pesto Is the Classic Garnish for this French Provençal Vegetable Soup 

Pistou is the French version of Pesto sauce. It is most often associated with the Provençal dish, Soupe au Pistou.

Although you can serve Soupe au Pistou almost anytime, it’s best from late spring through early fall (which is basil-growing weather). So it’s in season right now. And it’s versatile — the best versions contain whatever vegetables are in season and fresh.

So all that zucchini and summer squash that’s coming online in your garden, or overflowing the bins at your farmers’ market? This soup is their fate.

Pesto Pasta

Fresh Basil in the Market Means Pesto Season Is Here

Have you been seeing a lot of fresh basil in farmers’ markets lately? Have the basil plants in your garden become lush and abundant, seemingly overnight? Yup, that means warm weather is here to stay — and basil is in season.

Basil is an extraordinarily flavorful herb, useful in all sorts of recipes. But it’s the diva in Pesto, where it conspires with olive oil, pine nuts, a hint of garlic, and (almost always) Parmesan cheese to form a substance so addictive that it would be banned if it wasn’t so wholesome. And you can make it in about 5 minutes.

If you have another 10 minutes or so, you can make Pesto Pasta, a stellar main course dish. What’s not to like?