Summer

Almond and peach flavors are totally apropos for one another – probably because they’re cousins! Peaches are in the almond family. Just take a gander at a peach pit’s inner pit or the blossoms even – you’ll see the family connection for sure! I won’t bore you with the horticultural nomenclature, Latin naming, bark similarities and inner cambium layers of their trunks: just trust me – they’re related!

My sisters and I had the best extension of siblings with our first cousins growing and still do today! Something about having your own playmates from your own family tree is so fun. Growing up in a small town, we often were mistaken as “oh he’s one of those Brantley kids” or “she’s that Farmer girl isn’t she?” and for the sake of not splitting hairs, we’d just answer “ yes’m or yes sir” accordingly. We’ve always been glad to be the from the same tribe!

The kissin’ cousins in this recipe are the amaretto cookies, almond liqueur and the peaches. They are a household of flavor all to themselves! I can remember my Mema, my great-grandmother, and my Mimi, my grandmother, being the most temperate of ladies – “lips that touch wine shan’t touch mine!” was often exclaimed. Yet, there was always a bottle of almond liqueur, grand manier, sherry or Lydia Pinkum cough syrup somewhere in the pantry or medicine cabinet! I guess they had to say such an expression because they married Baptists. I digress…

Homemade ice cream is a great tradition for the Fourth of July. Undoubtedly it hits the spot on a hot summer day. And we all know store bought ice cream is nothing compared to homemade.

When I was sixteen I discovered my love of coconut frozen yogurt. Penguin’s Frozen Yogurt moved into my town and were looking for a bunch of teenagers to hire. It was a chain that was growing by leaps and bounds due to their popularity. After three…long…interviews I was hired. Can you believe three interviews for a job at a frozen yogurt place? Sheesh.

Anyway, coconut was a flavor we had maybe once a month. I loved it and it was all I would eat for the few days we had it. Since then I always seek out coconut ice cream…I never see it anywhere as coconut frozen yogurt…which is okay by me! I prefer ice cream.

So this ice cream…wow. Wow. Wow. It really is the best and there are so many possibilities of toppings, it make me dizzy just thinking about all of them.

In summers past, I grew yellow squash with great success. The plants spread to every inch of the garden, threatening to overwhelm tomato plants, the herb garden and a small patch of arugula. After the vines firmly established themselves, the long, fat squash seemed to appear overnight. What to do with all those squash?

A neighbor saved the day. She loved squash blossoms. She would nip the problem in the bud, so to speak, by picking blossoms before the squash could appear.

Ultimately our best solution was avoidance. We stopped planting squash. Problem solved.

But I missed squash's pleasant crunch and clean flavor. Last week we were gifted with a basket of zucchini and yellow squash from our next-door neighbor's front yard garden. Picked while they were young, before they became watery, the zucchini and squash were unblemished, firm and the picture of health.