Recipe for Chard and Garlic Scape Pesto

I loved this Garlic Scape Pesto, which I froze using mini muffin tins.

Back in 2006 I discovered garlic scapes and made some Garlic Scape Pesto.   I liked the garlic scape pesto, but garlic scapes are such a strongly-flavored ingredient that this year when my friend Margarethe gave me some garlic scapes that she'd gotten in her CSA box, I thought it would be fun to try mixing them in pesto with something else.  I first thought of kale, but when I went out into the garden the chard was calling out to me, and I thought this Chard and Garlic Scape pesto was just a brilliant combination.  I like it on pasta, but I've also been mixing a few tablespoons into scrambled eggs when they're nearly cooked.  If you don't have garlic scapes, I'd still try chard pesto made with minced garlic, which I think would also be a nice combination.

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Friday Night Photos: Eating Garden Veggies and Waiting for Ripe Tomatoes (2011 Garden Update #6)

I'm waiting anxiously for my beloved Green Zebra tomatoes to start ripening!

I love this time of year when fresh vegetables from the garden are the first thing you consider when deciding what to cook.  Of course the challenge of gardening is dealing with plants that produce more than you can use, while waiting eagerly for other plants that seem slow to ripen.  Right now my garden is producing huge amounts of yellow squash, zucchini, cucumbers, green beans, chard, dark green kale and Red Russian kale.  I've been thinking about how to use those plants, while at the same time I'm looking longingly at the tomatoes and wishing I'd start to see a few more ripe ones.

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Recipe for Easy Cheesy Zucchini Bake

If you like zucchini, fresh basil, and cheese, you'll love this Easy Cheesy Zucchini Bake.

When I noticed how many people are visiting my round-up of 50 Zucchini Recipes I knew it was time to spotlight this fantastic new zucchini recipe called Easy Cheesy Zucchini Bake, recommended by my sister Pam.  She found the recipe in Penzeys Back to School 2011 Catalog , where it was submitted by Karen Niessing.  Pam changed the recipe a little and then I changed it a tiny bit more, and we were both impressed with how this very basic idea of tossing zucchini with a few fresh and dried herbs and cheese and then baking it can produce a dish that's so delicious.  I could make an entire meal of this, but it would also be perfect as a zucchini side dish, and Pam told me she ate some of her leftovers for breakfast one day.  If you have zucchini from your garden or the farmers market, you must try this!

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Kalyn's Used-to-Be Famous Recipe for Lake Powell Fish Marinade (Grilled Mahi Mahi)

This fish marinade is a recipe that used to be famous, at least with my Lake Powell friends!

(Updated with new photos and better instructions July 2011) There was at time when this flavorful and versatile fish marinade was probably my most famous recipe, at least the recipe was certainly something that got requested often by the clients and friends I used to cook for at Utah's beautiful Lake Powell. That was back in the days when the South Beach Diet didn't exist, and no one had ever heard of sustainable seafood either, and at the lake I'd often use the marinade on Thresher Shark. Now I like this on Mahi Mahi, which is the fish shown in these photos. Do I dare say that this is a good marinade if you're cooking for people who are suspicious about fish? It's true that the flavors of the marinade make grilled fish a bit less "fishy" so if that's something that appeals to you, this may become your favorite way to cook fish on the grill.

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Mediterranean Lettuce Salad Recipe with Purslane, Mint, Tomatoes, Cucumbers, and Sumac-Lemon Vinaigrette

There's a lot to love about this Mediterranean Lettuce Salad with Purslane!

In case anyone reading this might have a fleeting thought that lettuce salads are boring, let me start by telling you that this Mediterranean Lettuce Salad with Purslane, Mint, Tomatoes, Cucumbers, and Sumac-Lemon Vinaigrette was one of the most exciting things I've made for weeks.  First, there's Sumac, one of my favorite flavors and a seasoning I think many Americans are missing out on.  Then there is Purslane, one of the healthiest plants in the world.  (Purslane has more omega-3 fatty acid than any other plant.)  Plus, if you have a garden you can probably find Purslane growing as a weed!  Take Sumac and Purslane and add red leaf lettuce, mint, cucumbers, fresh tomatoes, and lemon and you have most of my favorite summer flavors, combined in a salad that's about as healthy as you can get!

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Recipe for Chopped Greek-Style Salad with Red, Yellow, and Orange Bell Pepper

I love the many colors of peppers in this Greek-style salad, but you can use just one color if you prefer.

(Updated with better photos and instructions July 2011.)   When I went to Greece I was surprised that what I'd thought of as Greek Salad didn't seem to exist there.  Instead, every little restaurant had a dish they called country salad or village salad, which had cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, green peppers, Kalamata olives, and feta, and a dressing which always contained oregano.  Now a few years later, one of my favorite Salt Lake City restaurants calls this combination Greek Salad and when it has lettuce added, they call it American Greek Salad.  That works for me, and I do really like this type of chopped Greek-style salad without lettuce.

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Friday Night Photos: Cute Kids, New Friends, and Another Fun Time at Hires

The family tradition continues with Aunt Kalyn taking the kids to Hires!

It's interesting how the most ordinary of events can turn into a family tradition.  Many of you who read my blog know I have a huge extended family, and for years my 39 nieces and nephews have been taking turns visiting Aunt Kalyn and eating at Hires.  Now there are a generation of great nieces and nephews (52 at last count!)  Many of them have also eaten at Hires with Aunt Kalyn just like their parents did.   I started this Hires tradition long before I ever heard of the South Beach Diet, and a Big H with onion rings from Hires is a real indulgence for me now, but don't you agree that family traditions are more important than sticking to your diet every single day of your life?

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Recipe for Tarragon Shrimp Salad with Celery, Green Onion, and Celery Seed

I loved how French Tarragon from the garden perked up the flavors in this shrimp salad.

I had probably been growing herbs for at least 15 years before I discovered French Tarragon, but now I just can't imagine my herb garden without this distinctive and interesting flavor.  Tarragon has a flavor that's a little similar to fresh basil, but it's more licorice flavored and slightly less spicy.  In this Tarragon shrimp Salad with Celery, Green Onion, and Celery Seed the tarragon really brought out the other flavors.  If you don't have French Tarragon I recommend substituting basil, but please don't try making this with dried tarragon, which really doesn't taste much like fresh tarragon at all.

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Kalyn's Kitchen Picks: Popsicle Tropicals Sugar Free Popsicles

When it's really hot outside, these tropical-flavored popsicles are a sugar-free treat!

(I first recommended this product in 2005, it's being made an official Kalyn's Kitchen Pick July 2011.)  Temperatures in Salt Lake are in the 90's and I have two very cute boys visiting my house, so we've been cooling down with Popsicle Sugar Free Tropicals, one of my favorite guilt-free summer treats.  I've tried many brands of sugar-free ice pops, but this is the one I keep coming back to because of the tropical flavors.  My favorite is tropical orange, but I also like the Caribbean fruit punch and Hawaiian pineapple flavor.   And yes, it's a little silly to get excited about a sugar-free popsicle, but when it's scorching hot outside these do taste deliciously refreshing.

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Recipe for Garbanzo, Tomato, and Cilantro Salad with Lime and Chile Dressing (with or without avocado)

I like this Garbanzo, Tomato, and Cilantro Salad even more with the addition of avocado!

(This recipe was revisited July 2011 and updated with better photos and the idea of adding avocado.)  I first made this Garbanzo, Tomato, and Cilantro salad in 2006, right before I went to my first-ever Blogher conference (and how little I realized at the time how attending that conference would enrich my life!)  Now I'm getting ready to go next month to what will be my eighth BlogHer sponsored event, and this recipe is ready for a little makeover.  My fondness for cilantro has been well documented on the blog, and I got the idea of combining it with garbanzos and tomatoes from a blog called Imagnifique, but after I made the salad from the recipe I'd printed back in 2006, the blog had disappeared.  Then in 2007 I spotted another version of the salad with Avocado, which I thought was an inspired addition. Thanks to Mooncrazy from Peanut Butter Etouffee for that variation.  If you like cilantro, garbanzos, and tomatoes, I bet you'll love this simple combination.

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Recipe for 100% Whole Wheat Quick Bread with Za'atar, Feta, Olives, and Green Onions

I swooned over this whole wheat bread with Za'atar, Feta, Olives, and Green Onions

You may be wondering why I'm making bread during the hottest part of the summer, but actually I made this 100% Whole Wheat Quick Bread with Za'atar, Feta, Olives, and Green Onions several weeks ago and used my toaster oven to bake it without heating up the house.  I love savory quick bread recipes like this one, where all you do is mix the ingredients together and bake, and less than an hour later you have delicious hot bread to enjoy.  This bread was so flavorful it didn't even need anything on it, and it was a good thing I sent most of it home with a visitor or I would have eaten far too much of it after it came out of the oven.

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Low-Glycemic Recipes from My Food Blogging Friends

Photo of Roasted Vegetable and Barley Salad from FamilyStyle Food

Last month I had the idea of periodically sharing low-glycemic recipes from my food blogging friends.  My thinking was that I'm spotlighting phase one recipes from other blogs in the monthly Phase One Recipe Round-ups, but actually people who end up committing to the low-glycemic way of eating only stay on phase one for a few weeks.  There are plenty of delicious foods you can eat for phase one, but once you get past those two weeks and start adding healthy whole grains into your diet, there are even more tasty options for a low-glycemic diet.  (If you don't know what I'm talking about, Wikipedia does a good job of explaining the glycemic index, a healthful way to eat for everyone whether or not you're trying to lose weight or have blood-sugar issues.)

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Friday Night Photos: Progress in the Garden (2011 Garden Update #5)

One of the crops plants I'm having fun growing this year is onions!

Here's an update on the progress in my garden.  I've been telling everyone who visits my house how thrilled I am with my greatly improved garden, with drip irrigation and black cloth/gravel around the beds.  I think making those changes last fall has decreased my weeding by at least 75% this year.  Things are growing well, and one of the crops I'm having the most fun watching are the onions shown above, started by my brother-in-law Clayton in his greenhouse.   This is the first time I've grown onions, and I'm looking forward to the first time I can walk out into the garden and pull out an onion for something I'm cooking!

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Not-so-Dumb Salad with Cucumbers, Tomatoes, Onions, Avocado, and Balsamic Vinegar (Low-Carb, Gluten-Free, Paleo)

A reader sent this tasty idea for a tomato-cucumber-avocado salad dressed with just balsamic vinegar!

There are a lot of salads with tomatoes and cucumbers on this blog.  That's partly because I love tomatoes and cucumbers and grow them in my garden every year.  To me that combination just screams summer, but I also eat tomatoes and cucumbers all year (whenever I can get good flavorful tomatoes and Persian cucumbers from Costco.)  So when a reader from Hawaii named Lisa sent me her recipe for "dumb salad" and said it was something she made often, I was interested.  Lisa discovered this combination when she was going out of town and needed to use what was on hand, and I promise you, this salad idea that combines cucumbers, tomatoes, onion, avocado, and balsamic vinegar is not dumb at all!  Of course, only make this when you have fresh flavorful tomatoes, but I loved the combination of flavors, accented with just a little good sea salt and some coarse ground black pepper.  And I also love the idea of a salad with no added oil except the "good fat" from the avocado.   

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Kalyn's Kitchen Picks: Ruby Red Grapefruit Crystal Light Drink Mix

"Better for me than Diet Coke" is my theory about this favorite summer drink.

Are you a water drinker?  I'm impressed by people who always say "I'll just have water" when a server asks for drink orders.  More often than not I'll ask for Diet Coke, and although I drink far more water now than I did a few years ago (thanks to a mini-fridge in my office filled with bottles of water) I'm afraid I'm never going to be one of those people who easily chooses water over other drinks.   That's why I'm glad I love, love, love the Ruby Red Grapefruit flavor of Crystal Light, because when it's hot outside this is something I'll often choose over Diet Coke.  Of course I know plenty of you aren't going to consider "better for you than Diet Coke" much of a recommendation, so if you feel that way, then just click on to the next blog.  (Please don't leave comments lecturing me about artificial sweeteners; I believe everyone is entitled to make their own food choices.)  However, if you're someone who'd like to cut down on the soda pop habit, give this product a try!

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Recipe for CrockPot Rice with Dried Mushrooms, Herbs, and Parmesan

Delicious Rice with Dried Mushrooms, Parmesan, and Herbs made in the slow cooker!

Did you know you could put rice, seasonings, dried mushrooms, and stock into your slow cooker and a few hours later you'll have a delicious rice side dish without heating up the house or watching it at all?  I'm thinking this is the perfect rice dish for a hot summer day when you're preparing for a party, or even for Sunday when you're gone to church but want dinner ready when you get home.  This way of cooking rice was completely new to me, and I was so pleased with the results that I'm already imagining lots of other rice dishes made in the slow cooker.

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Five Fun Things on Friday (7-8-11)

50 image from Buzzle.com, best 50 year birthday gift ideas ever from Suebob!

I didn't have any kind of timetable in mind when I first started doing these Five Fun Things on Friday posts, but it seems like I'm doing one about once a month.  Today it felt like time for another one, and I'm going to start out with the best 50 year birthday idea ever.  If anyone thought it was me turning 50 when you saw that number, I love you forever, but keep reading to hear how a very classy friend of mine asked friends to celebrate her birthday.

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Recipe for Whole Wheat Orzo and Grilled Vegetable Salad with Feta, Olives, and Herbs

So far, this Whole Wheat Orzo Salad is my favorite new salad recipe this summer!

I'm becoming just a little infatuated with whole wheat orzo.  I first tried it last year in a very tasty salad with tomatoes, Kalamata olives, and feta, and I've already made the salad featured in this post three times and gobbled it up each time.  If you're not familiar with orzo, it's a tiny pasta shaped similar to rice but slightly bigger.   It's often used in soups and pilafs, but it's also a perfect pasta salad ingredient because it letts the pasta take a supporting role and puts the spotlight on the other ingredients.  Orzo is made with wheat, but for a gluten-free alternative I think brown rice would also be great in any salad that uses orzo.

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Recipe for Low-Sugar Mango Sorbet (without an ice-cream freezer)

Next time I would freeze this Low-Sugar Mango Sorbet for 30 minutes longer, but otherwise it was perfect!

Please look at this photo of Mango Sorbet made with no added sugar and imagine I had been able to leave it in the freezer for maybe 30 minutes more, and then it would have been completely perfect!  I was going to a party and had to take photos of this just a little sooner than I would have liked, but if the sorbet was a tiny bit too soft, that's easily fixed next time.  I don't have an ice cream freezer, so I made this using a method I found in the comments at AllRecipes, where I found the recipe I adapted for the sorbet.  Mangoes are one of my very favorite fruits, but now that this turned out so well I find myself thinking of a few other fruits it would be fun to make into sorbet for the hot weather we're having.

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Recipe for Grilled Fish with Garlic, Basil, and Lemon (Halibut, Tilapia, or Mahi Mahi)

This delicious fish marinade with garlic, basil, and lemon is good on Halibut, Tilapia, or Mahi Mahi.

(This recipe was revisited and finally updated with photos July 2011!)  It's a big holiday weekend in the U.S., and tonight I'm going to a birthday party for Nick, the charming 85 year old dad of my good friend Mary.  Nick and Mary's husband Ken were both born on July 3, so my memories of the Fourth of July involve lots of birthday parties for them.  No doubt July 4th is one of the biggest grilling days of the year for most Americans, and while most people probably grill burgers for the birthday of our nation, around here you're much more likely to find fish or chicken in my grilling recipes.  This easy recipe for grilled fish marinated in a combination of garlic, basil, and lemon is something I made for years when I was catering houseboat trips at Lake Powell, and  this recipe is long overdue for some photos.  I did get a little overly-enthusiastic with the grill marks, which is what will happen if you forget to turn your grill down to medium-high when you put the fish on, but the halibut in this photo was still lip-smackingly good!

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South Beach Diet Phase One Recipes Round-Up for June 2011 (Low-Glycemic Recipes)

Kalyn's favorite Phase One Recipe for June 2001 has to be Lettuce Wrap Fish Tacos.

It's happened again.  Every month I feel like the days go screaming by and I'm barely paying attention to saving links for my monthly round-up of South Beach Diet Phase One Recipes I've posted on Kalyn's Kitchen or spotted on other food blogs during the month.  Then when I look in Delicious (where I save the bookmarks), I'm surprised at how many good recipes I've found.  There must be a lesson here about Phase One, wouldn't you say?  Apparently it's not too terribly difficult to make good food that's also Phase One.  Of course I realize that if you're in the U.S. there's a big holiday coming up, so you may be starting Phase One this weekend, but these recipes will still be here when you're through celebrating.

(You can use the label Low-Glycemic Recipe Round-Ups to see all the posts like this one.)

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