The Joys of Summer

There are certain foods I always associate with summer, mostly ones prepared the way my mom did. Tomatoes, of course, in a sandwich with mayonnaise, and in a salad that my mom made. She cut them in chunks, added salt, pepper, red wine vinegar, and dried oregano. That's it - no oil! The juice from the tomatos would release as it sat. My brother and I would drink it after all the tomatoes were gone. Corn on the cob, with lots of butter and salt. Cucumbers and onions in sour cream. Potato salad, made with melted bacon grease (!) and mayo, celery, salt & pepper (no onion, please). And stewed zucchini, cut in big chunks and cooked with tomatoes and Italian seasonings (again, no oil). This was even good cold the next day, sprinkled with grated Romano (can you tell we were big into the dairy?)



I made the zucchini last night, and wanted to add some dumplings to it. I used Bryanna's Featherlight Dumplings from the "(Almost) No Fat Cookbook." They were indeed light, but more like biscuits than what I would consider dumplings - smooth and silky, not floury like a biscuit. Does anyone have a good dumpling recipe? As you can see, the dumplings cooked up giant size and took over the pot. Still, they were good, especially alongside some yummy baked tofu (just the tofu part, not the olives, bay leaves, etc)! Now, if only I could sub out something for the bacon grease in the potato salad!



And yet one more joy of summer........