Simply Delicious For Spring! Fresh Pesto Caesar Salad

It is finally March in the Carolina's, which means that Mother Nature is starting to show her beautiful signs of spring!   Daffodils and pansies are in bloom, and day lilies are pushing their green leaves out of the warming soil.  After all of the grey days of the "uary" months (as my husband and I call them . . . Jan"uary" and Febr"uary"), we welcome the hints of green that begin to show us hope for spring and the coming warmer days ahead.  We spent the weekend cleaning out all of our gardens, tilling and preparing the soil, and mulching our flower beds.  

To some this seems to be nothing but work.  

Yet for me, it's just a joy to be outside again after feeling confined indoors for months.  

Spring is simply my favorite time of year!

the colors of vibrant blue and yellow just captivate the eyes!

joyful, happy, yellow daffodils announce springtime

and the happy faces of blue/purple pansies that show off this rarest of garden colors!

"Green" is also this month's theme for the March Cooking Light Virtual Supper Club hosted by Val from "More Than Burnt Toast".  A perfectly timed theme!  I chose to make a lighter version of the classic Caesar Salad and was wondering throughout the process how this salad could be 'outstanding' as described on the Cooking Light web-site.

Oh wow, does this salad live up to its definition!  After cleaning my salad plate, I ate the rest of the salad out of the mixing bowl!  

My husband had one piece of lettuce and immediately turned up his nose and said, "Ugh, I taste those little anchovies, but I suppose I could enjoy this."  He just dislikes anchovies like no other!

. . . poor guy!  I just don't know what I'm going to do with him sometimes!

But this salad is just incredible, despite it's reduction in calories thanks to the ingenious folks of Cooking Light magazine . . .  and I'll make it over and over again!  I made a few adjustments by adding a little more olive oil to thin down the dressing and added one more clove of minced garlic (I mean, "why not?").  I also used olive oil-based mayonnaise instead of canola mayonnaise.  After all, this is an Italian salad!

Pesto Caesar Salad

3 oz. Italian bread, sliced, then cut into 1/2-inch cubes

1-1/2 tsp. extra-virgin olive oil (I doubled this, you need it!)
Italian-blend seasonings (I added this)

Cooking spray

2 ounces Parmigiana-Regiano cheese

1/4 cup canola mayonnaise (I used olive oil-based mayonnaise)

3 Tbsp. refrigerated pesto (I used my own home-made pesto)

4 tsp. water
2 - 3 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil (my addition)

2 tsp. fresh lemon juice

1 tsp. anchovy paste

1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

1/2 tsp. Dijon mustard

1/8 tsp. hot pepper sauce (I used Tabasco)

1 garlic clove, minced (I doubled this to two cloves)

12 cups torn romaine lettuce
anchovy slices for garnish (my addition)
freshly cracked black pepper and sea salt to taste (my addition)

Take a fresh loaf of Italian bread

cut about 4 - 5 slices 1" wide, then cut into 1" cubes

place on a baking sheet in a 400 degree oven 

toast for 10 minutes 

(watch them carefully so the bread cubes do not burn)

toss the warm toasted bread cubes with the olive oil

I also added some 'Tuscan" Italian-blend seasonings

grate fresh Parmigiana-Regiano cheese

prepare dressing with olive oil-based mayonnaise

using pesto and the following fresh ingredients.

I freeze tiny little containers of basil pesto every summer 

(click on 'basil pesto' for the link)

this holds about 3Tbsp. of pesto . . . just perfect!

squeeze 2 tsp. fresh lemon juice

mince 2 cloves of fresh garlic

in a medium mixing bowl, add all of the ingredients

add anchovy paste, Dijon mustard, Worcesteshire sauce, 

lemon juice, and minced garlic

place freshly cut romaine lettuce in a large salad bowl

add the dressing

toss well

add the toasted bread cubes, toss well

serve on pretty plates

garnish with grated Parmigiana-Regiano cheese

and anchovy fillets

Crack fresh black pepper and sea salt all over to taste!

Preheat oven to 400°.

Place bread in a large bowl; drizzle with oil. Toss to coat.
Arrange bread in a single layer on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray.
Bake at 400° for 10 minutes or until golden, turning once.
Grate 2 tablespoons cheese; shave remaining cheese to equal about 6 tablespoons. Set shaved cheese aside.
Combine grated cheese, mayonnaise, and next 8 ingredients (including the pesto, through garlic) in a medium bowl, stirring well with a whisk.
Combine croutons and lettuce in a large bowl.
Drizzle mayonnaise mixture over lettuce mixture; toss to coat.

Place individual portions of the salad on each plate.
Top each serving with 1 tablespoon shaved cheese.

Now here are the other "Green" and lighter, fresh recipes that the others brought to the Cooking Light Virtual Supper Club this month:

• Val of More Than Burnt Toast prepared a Creamy Feta Spinach Dip that is perfect served with flat pita bread.
• Susan of The Spice Garden prepared a Salad with New Hampshire Maple-Mustard Dressing.
• Sarah of All Our Fingers in the Pie brought the main entree of Shrimp in Green Sauce.
• Jerry of Jerry's Thoughts, Musings and Rants put together a delicious Salmon with Cucumber Salad and Dill Sauce.
• Sandi of Whistlestop Cafe Cooking accompanied the menu with refreshing Lemony Snap Peas. 

Here are some other delicious salads that I have prepared that I know that you will enjoy:

Panzanella Salad with Pancetta, Tomato and Basil

Spring Salad with Strawberries and Balsamico Vinaigrette

Prosciutto, Goat Cheese, and Cherry Summer Salad

and

Fresh Fig, Gorgonzola, Arugula and Balsamico Vinaigrette Salad

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Butterflies, Bumblebees, and Blue Blossoms in The Gardens

Blue . . . one of the most difficult colors to include in a garden, and especially in large amounts that bloom for longer periods of time to enjoy!  And who doesn't love the color of blue?

I've got blue iris that bloom for about a week and a half in the spring, little blue pansies in the winter that you can barely see, some Russian sage, and a few blue hydrangea that I can't grow further than a few inches with the hungry deer out here in the countryside.

So for this "Wordless Wednesday", which I am now officially re-naming "A Walk in The Gardens Wednesday" (at least on my blogs that's what I'm going to focus my Wednesdays on), I'm focusing on the color of blue in our gardens!  While outside mowing the front pasture this afternoon before the rains set in, I was just staring at these huge, awesome, and completely-covered-with-blue-blossom bushes, and had this little 'a ha' moment for today's post.

These beautiful perennial blue bushes grow larger every year, are incredibly carefree (well you might want to give them some nice fertilizer food twice a month like I do to keep them extra happy and blooming), THRIVE in the heat and drought, require minimal watering, are deer resistant (YAY!) and attract butterflies and bumblebees to 'healthily' your gardens even more!

About four years ago, we lined our very long driveway with these blue floral bushes mixed with taller pink crepe myrtle trees and some green 'adiago' grasses (also beginning to bloom right now . . . but that's another garden post).  All heat and drought lovers!  And when you live on an acreage with a 'well', you have to be ever-so-careful with your water use!

Everyone asks me:  what is the name of those bushes?  "Blue Mist Shrubs" aka: "Caryopteris".  You can buy these guys in small pots in a specialty nursery (not Lowe's, Home Depot, or WalMart) for around $5.00 or so.  THEY GROW FAST, so don't worry!  The second year of bloom is mind-boggling with how fast and how large they grow with so many blue blooms.  They reach about 4 to 5 feet tall and so you need to plant them at least 3 feet apart, a point at which they will grow together into a lovely hedge!

PLUS, when summer is ending and everything else in your garden has finished blooming, except for those annuals that we plant for color, these bushes just show off among the greenery, along with the flowering crepe myrtles!

Only a few negatives:  They lose their leaves in the winter because they are woody bushes, not evergreen.  Plus, as a good gardener, you need to cut them back in the spring just like you would do with your ornamental grasses so that they have a healthy growth in the coming summer season.

But let me tell you, they are so worth it!  I look forward to these blue blooms at the end of every summer before everything turns yellow, gold, orange, and red in fall.

This is just one of summer's 'last hurrah' in the gardens!

one bumblebee so drunk in happiness, he's upside down!

we have these bushes mixed in with our pink crepe myrtle trees (for height).  

This little crepe myrtle is 3 years old that we planted at just about 2 feet tall 

-- the deer made it difficult to get them to this height, but with patience, 

they will continue to grow and fill out!

blue, blue, blue . . . covered with blue blossoms!

a BIG THANK YOU to the editors of "Bon Bon Break" an on-line e-magazine for featuring this post in their publication which you can find by clicking on this link!

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Wordless Wednesday in the Garden!

ruby red stems of swiss chard in my garden

simply beautiful!

che bella!

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Almost Wordless Wednesday in the Gardens!

When all else fails to bloom in late summer, 

in the South there's always the prolific blooms of Crepe Myrtles!

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Salsa Canning Mania!

I have been canning homemade salsa every summer with fresh tomatoes, peppers, and cilantro from our gardens since 1994.  But as a result, I've also created somewhat of a monster situation in my family . . . meeting the demand by family members for this salsa!  Bill and I usually can three times per summer, at 20 pints per large batch.  Whenever we return to the Midwest for our annual summer visits we had better include a bushel of S.C. peaches and a box of canned salsa or we're read the Italian riot act of disappointment by the family!

Canning salsa is an event, baby!  I mean if you haven't canned yet, just let me warn you, it's time-consuming, steamy-hot, and often back-breaking work . . . but oh so worth it in terms of the rewarding pleasure given in return.  Plus you know that you are continuing on an age-old tradition of food preservation!  My husband and I can together (isn't that romantic?) . . . it's a bonding thing!  And yesterday we just finished a second batch of our family's favorite salsa.  Because it really requires a lot of time and energy, we decided that two large batches was enough for this summer since Bill is returning to teaching classes for fall semester this week and my back isn't ready yet to handle this arduous job without him.

For those of you who have been reading my blog since 2008, you may have noticed that I never prepare Mexican food . . . simply because we'd rather go to our favorite Mexican eatery in town to enjoy it where they do such a superb job of preparing the food.  I don't even bother to try and replicate Mexican cuisine at home.  Canning salsa, on the other hand, is the one and only exception.

this is about 1/3rd of the jars that we canned; the other jars were already in the pantry and we were too tired to pull them back out again just for a photo!

Since we started canning salsa, we've never purchased another commercially produced jar of salsa EVER!  The flavor of super fresh summer tomatoes simply cannot be topped!  Plus it's really healthy!  As far as a recipe, we don't have one, cooking by instinct the way that my mother taught me.  But we include the typical basics that everyone loves in salsa:  garden-fresh tomatoes (and we use all varieties for a more complex flavor), green peppers, onions, jalapeño peppers, and little personal twists here and there.  We also make a variety of different spiced versions depending on the type of chili peppers used:  serranos, jalapeños, chipotles, etc.  The final acceptability of flavor is simply achieved by tasting, tasting, tasting until it is just right!  Some of my family prefers this salsa as plain and simple as possible, others like it spiced up, and others like it as hot as the sun itself.

Another thing about our salsa, we don't use a food processor as some people do to save time.  We like ours 'salsa crude' or chunky.  This means that you need to set aside a nice amount of time to sit and chop all the ingredients.  Honestly, this is one of my favorite things involved in cooking.  I just love the process of being with the ingredients, smelling, touching, and tasting as I go.  Even the chopping sound on the cutting boards is like a welcome song to me.

Sort of a zen-state in cooking! :-D

we like our salsa on the thicker side, so this requires a good hour of simmering on the stove.  you can see how chunky we also make our salsa.

when cooking large batches of anything, we make quite a mess on the stove!

Here is a link for a good tutorial on canning salsa if you need one:  canning salsa instructions.  We can numerous sizes since we give so many jars away as gifts.  We've started to use more 1/2 pint jars simply because we give so much of this salsa away and it's getting pretty expensive.  The pint size jar is our most popular requested size.  The larger quart sizes, although used the least, are great to use to serve at parties and get-togethers such as this summer's family reunion.  When people stop by with unexpected goodies, we always have a jar of salsa on hand to give to friends in return.  I mail tons of this stuff to my sister in Iowa, our son in Chicago, and our daughter and hubby in Tennessee.

It's just darn good stuff with absolutely no preservatives, completely organically grown in our garden (that's right, no spraying any stuff on our garden allowed!).  Our veggies are also watered completely with natural well water.  I'm not sure what the caloric content is, but since it's all veggies, it can't be that high!

And now that I've made myself completely hungry, I think I'll go have some chips and salsa!


Mangia!


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A Stroll In My June Garden!

What would summer be without taking early morning and late evening strolls in beautiful flower gardens?  I just cannot imagine this season without the sight and smell of these beautiful blooms!  

Every year I add more perennials that usually take a good 3 years to expand and fill their spot in the garden.  And this year was the year for a great show of daylilies, roses, hostas, and sedum.  Here's just a few shots of how things are looking up outside of the kitchen:

Pink daylillies in front of hostas.

A close up shot of a buttery yellow daylilly.

"Blue Mammoth" is huge among other variegated hostas.

I love how the morning sun at dusk shines through delicate flower petals.

More daylillies!

The gardenias have been blooming since May!

"Knock Out" red roses just pop with vivid crimson color against the texture of the stone wall and walkway and the velvet-like green lawn (thanks to all of the rain that we received this year).  These rose bushes are only one year old, highly prolific, as well as being bug and disease-resistant too!

Another brilliant pink daylilly!

A patch of pink and chartreuse Sedum in front of a lime-colored "Sum and Substance" hosta, soon to be another huge plant, it's only 2 years old.

 Lastly a shot of a large bed of hostas, daylillies, and roses.  I just love water elements in gardens and this tall water fountain is perfect with a lovely, trickling sound out in the quiet of the countryside.  The azaleas are in their green stage, having already bloomed back in April.  We've already planted a new group of smaller hostas that will fill in the empty spaces after a few years of growth.  If there is one thing that gardens teach us, it's patience!

Thanks for going on this little garden stroll with me today!

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Bolognese Risotto Stuffed Peppers!

Mama mia!  More red peppers!  Well, I'm finished roasting and freezing peppers for the moment and just ready to prepare something for us to enjoy in the here and now.  Stuffed peppers just sounded really good right now, and I just made these with what I had on hand, adding a little bit of this and a little bit of that (and writing it down as I went along).

Living way out in the countryside, I've got to keep a well stocked pantry and 2 freezers-full of frozen foods.  This way I'm always fairly prepared and don't have to resort to wasting expensive gas driving to the nearest town for one or two items!  We learned very quickly when we moved to the Carolina's that things are REALLY spread out from each other.  Plus when I come home from my hour and a half long commute from work, I am in no mood to shop for groceries!

For this recipe, I used my family's Bolognese sauce recipe.  Mr. M. and P. will not eat anything without meat, so a good Bolognese makes his tummy happy every time!  Vegetarians can use marinara sauce instead, but it will taste different.  The best flavored Bolognese is part beef, part pork, and part veal.  At least that's the way we make ours.

The great thing about this recipe is that you can add what you like and delete what you don't like.  I think these would also be great with some sauteed, chopped porcini mushrooms added, or some diced prosciutto too!  Change the cheese varieties around, add some basil, etc!

Bill came home and dipped a spoon in some of the extra stuffing and said, "This is really, really good!"  Now that's a super comment coming from this quiet-natured man.

Before and after baking the stuffed peppers

Bolognese and Risotto Stuffed Peppers

4 bell peppers (red, yellow or a mix), halved lengthwise, tops and seeds removed
4 cups Bolognese sauce (I use my homemade sauce)
1/4 cup risotto
3/4 cup grated Asiago cheese
1 tsp. red pepper flakes
1 cup chopped Italian flat-leaf parsley, cut fresh from the garden if possible
1 tsp. sea salt
1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
Shredded Asiago cheese and chopped Italian flat leaf parsley for garnish.

Heat up the Bolognese sauce in a large sauce pan.
Fill a large pot half-way with water.
Bring the water to a boil; add risotto and cook for half of the time indicated on the package directions (it will continue to cook in the sauce and peppers).
Add the cheese to the sauce.
Add the Italian parsley.
Add the red pepper flakes.
Add salt and pepper and taste, taste, taste.
Add more of whatever you prefer for your own taste.

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.
Place the pepper halves in a bread loaf (keeps them in place when snug in this pan).
Fill each pepper half with the stuffing.
Sprinkle more grated cheese on top of each stuffed pepper.
Sprinkle with chopped Italian parsley (or after they're finished baking if you prefer).
Cover the dish with foil and bake until the peppers are tender and the filling is hot, about 30 minutes.

Such rich colors of summer!

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