Summer

Meteorologically speaking, fall has fallen. Maybe in parts well above the Mason-Dixon Line or high in the Appalachians, crisp mornings and whispers of Autumn proper are upon y'all. When I'm in Cashiers, I can feel it too, but whilst back in Perrydise, the equinoxes have not yielded one to another and summer still reigns supreme.

Indian Summer is what this seasonal limbo is often referred to. And summer garden produce is still coming in too! With the plethora of produce, a couple of my favorite dishes make their way to the table this time of year. In Dinner on the Grounds, I have my Cashiers Farmers Market Pasta, and from A Time to Cook, my Summer Garden Pasta comes to life on the pages.

I love this pasta. It's simple and delicious and full of flavor. It can be doused with cream and covered with cheese or served simply without the cheese and cream ... yet be so elegantly fresh and light. It's even better the next day reheated!

Plus, this is a pot and pan dish. Boil the pasta in a pot and sauté the veggies in a pan. Mix it all in the pan and serve! There'll be some chopping too but it's a fun meal. A meatless meal but you'll never miss it... Unless you just want a piece of salmon or some shrimp or sausage for good measure.

There was just enough of a breeze to keep us cool and comfortable. Six of us sat around the table on a backyard deck enjoying dinner together last night. Sipping white sangria and eating a meal made of stone fruits. Our hostess had thrown out a challenge for us. Each guest was to bring any dish that included stone fruit in the ingredient list.

My first thought was that we'd wind up with a bunch of desserts like peach crisp, plum tart, cherry pie. What is stone fruit? A stone fruit has a pit in the middle, surrounding a seed. Most well known stone fruits include peaches, plums, nectarines, cherries and apricots. But olives, almonds, mangoes and even dates are technically part of the stone fruit family.

Our entree turned out to be BLATs, sandwiches made of crispy bacon, fresh lettuce, slices of creamy avocado, thick rounds of tomato layered on bread that had been brushed with oil and toasted on just one side in the oven.

A simple pasta is a life saver. How many nights are you rescued from eating out of a box just because you know how to throw together a good simple pasta? First tip: Don’t just rely on tomato sauce to coat the pasta. I love good sweet, milky ricotta and when I’m at a store where I can find it I tend to go overboard and buy a bit too much. So it’s ricotta on toast for breakfast, ricotta with fruit for lunch and ricotta as the “sauce” for a quick seasonal pasta.

In this dish I started with ricotta, then saw I had some pesto, added a couple of tablespoons of that, then added some crunchy sweet baby tomatoes and slices of green onion. While I was waiting for my pasta water to boil I discovered a couple of tiny zucchini with flowers attached and an ear of corn that needed to be used up. So I cut the niblets off the corn, sliced the zucchini in half lengthwise and shredded the flowers with my fingers.

What would labor day be without grilling and hamburgers? Burgers are a mainstay of any backyard get-together. No party, especially one at my house, could ever take place without them. It's hard to believe that September is here and soon summer barbecuing will be over. But while the weather is warm there's still time for one last outdoor party before the leaves start falling. So if you are planning on making burgers, this is a recipe for something different.

Here is a burger with a slight English accent. First the meat mixture contains Worcestershire sauce, the famous condiment originally from Worcester, England. And there's Stilton, the British blue cheese. Any blue cheese would work in place of Stilton, but this cheese is worth searching for. It's strong flavor works surprisingly well with arugula and of course, beef. These burgers are tangy, pungent, and peppery.

Since I like to use lean beef, I bind the meat mixture with eggs and breadcrumbs to keep it from crumbling. The burgers are cooked just until done, rested, and then topped with Stilton, a slice of tomato, and arugula. Serve with buns of your choice. But before you add ketchup, mayo, or mustard, just try the burger as is. You might find it's juicy and flavorful enough to not need any condiment cover-up.