Today's quick summer appetizer recipe: A miniature bite of caprese salad, warm and cheesy. So really, how does Trader Joe's read my mind ? how does it know what I want before I walk the door? Blame it on all the Pretty Ways to Serve Summer's Best Tomatoes but I was feeling caprese-crazy. I stopped at Trader Joe's for those cute little mozzarella balls in the cheese section, certain I'd need to hit the farmers market later for tomatoes simultaneously big enough and small enough for the summer finger food embedded in my brain. But Trader Joe's had both the mozzarella and the perfect-size tomatoes! And in case you're wondering, no, this isn't a paid post, a sponsored post or anything like that. I'm just in awe. We might should put Trader Joe's in charge of male-female Mars-Venus communication where "reading minds" is helpful skill set.

This Veggie Evangelist came late to the "Avocado Craze" but is catching up, fast! Here you'll find a whole collection of avocado facts and seasonal avocado recipes, savory to sweet, salads to sides, soups to supper, simple to special. And of course, guacamole recipes too! PS Facebook & Pinterest users, if you like A Veggie Venture, be sure to "like" and "share" and "pin" this page. More and more, search engines and even real-live human beings rely on social media indicators to identify favorite sources of trusted information. Besides, aren't your friends avocado-crazy too?! IN A RUSH? Prefer Another Vegetable? Skip Straight to the Recipes or Switch to the A-Z of Vegetables . Avocado 101: THE BASICS Pronounced [ah-vuh-KAH-doe]. Plural of Avocado. Here's how to remember the plural of avocado, tee hee. "One avocado is good, enough avocados for guacamole is even better." Other Names for Avocado. Also called Avoc

Hello, Tomato Lovers! Here's just what you've been looking for, a collection of tips and photos, all the prettiest ways to serve sweet, juicy summer tomatoes. Who else is as excited as all get-out that it is tomato season?! We seasonal eaters, we wait all year long for this moment. A whole two tomato seasons ago now, I got this idea to collect pretty ways to serve the summer's best tomatoes. No cooking, no grilling, no roasting, just good tomatoes straight from the garden served in beautiful but simple ways. You'll see what inspired that idea, it's in the first photo below, a beautiful platter of tomato slices sprinkled with dainty white garlic chive flowers with a tiny tomato bouquet of flowers in the center. Yeah, I know, sooo simple and yet so pretty. I found so-so many ideas but pared them down to just fourteen, all from talented tomato-lovin' food bloggers. And as I studied the photos, trying really hard not to drool tomato juice, I realized th

Heads up, beet lovers! A quick 'n' easy beet salad, it makes up in five minutes. (Really!) This salad totally captivated friends who came for dinner last month, something to do with the earthy clove-y sweet beets in the same bite as bursts of summer blueberries. But if you're cooking for one or two? Good news, that works really well too. Weight Watchers PointsPlus 1. Low Cal. Low Carb. Gluten Free. Not just vegan, " Vegan Done Real ". Oh, people! This is such a great summer salad! And it's no more than pickled beets, summer blueberries and some fresh mint. (Really, that's it!) It was one of three salads I made for our Midsummer party back in June – all which went-went-went but half to my surprise, it was the Pickled Beet Salad that sooo many people remarked upon. Ours was a mixed gathering of foodies + family. The foodies? All over this salad. (The family? Not.So.Much. So goes my life.) One quote? "I hope no one's counting but I'm going ba

Today's oh-so-simple but still sumptuous tomato recipe: Perfectly ripe summer tomatoes marinated in gentle vinegar and good olive oil with slivers of onion and fresh herbs. Yeah that's it but is it ever heavenly! Weight Watchers Friendly, WW PointsPlus 2. Low Cal. Low Carb. Gluten Free. Paleo. Not just vegan, " Vegan Done Real ". Tis a happy day, the day the first tomato ripens. We sit in the shade to share the first one like an apple: better one tomato than two, somehow, for this heady moment. The flesh is already warm from the morning sun, tomato juices run down our chins. We grin: summer has arrived! Soon we'll be doing all the things gardeners do with what will soon become a glut of tomatoes – a summer-only tomato soup , the Italian bread salad , even making homemade mayonnaise just for BLTs. But this very first tomato? It's always the best of the summer. Once or twice a week for the rest of the tomato season, the evening meal will include either Ma

So much to love about zucchini noodles, aka "zoodles"! Here I've paired the spiral zucchini noodles with leftover lobster, oo-la-la, it's completely special but still, it's on the table in a fast 15 minutes. Weight Watchers Friendly, just 5 PointsPlus. Low Carb. High Protein. Gluten Free. Paleo. And naturally, totally tasty. I even thought about calling it "OMG Zucchini Noodles with Leftover Lobster". So leftover lobster is a definite "first" for me and at age someputty-something, the math says that leftover lobster is likely a "once-in-a-lifetime" experience too. But the thing is? I would totally buy lobster just to make this again. Let me back up a tiny step? So we had a little shindig here on Saturday to celebrate the longest day of the year Scandinavian-style. If you're keen for the menu for our Scandinavian Midsummer feast, it's here . But the short story is that the menu was all about the fish. We went kinda crazy,

Vegetables for Breakfast? You bet! Or for Meatless Monday? Naturally! Quickly cook some ratatouille vegetables (that's eggplant, zucchini and tomato for starters) and then top it with incredible-edible eggs. Weight Watchers Friendly, WW 6 PointsPlus. Low Cal. Gluten Free. Paleo. Vegetarian. Whole 30. Did I mention? So totally good! Um, so yeah, where were we? Not blogging, or even cooking, that's for sure. In the past four weeks, I criss-crossed the country, racking up 5900 miles driving between St. Louis and North Carolina and back (for a day); St. Louis and the Texas Hill Country (hauling a furniture-filled U-Haul, a four-hundred pound rock and an after-wedding brunch for 25) and back (for two days); then St. Louis and northern Minnesota and back (for two days). Yikes. As if that weren't enough? Then we packed up eleven of us for a week in the hot sun and cool waves of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Twas all good but no surprise, right? I-Am-So-Ready-to-Be-Home. And food