Well, we are all moved in to our new place, and are somewhat settled.  So far we love it!  We have a backyard for the first time ever and have spent lots of nights outside eating dinner and playing with Jacob and our dog Nikko.

We’ve had a lot of company come and visit us, my parents and sisters and their husbands all came to see our new place, and Jeremy’s parents have also been out.  Jake has been loving his grandparent and aunt time.

Amidst all of the chaos we have been eating out a lot more than normal.  I’m getting pretty confident eating at the Outback Steakhouse in Louisville, CO and the P.  F. Chang’s in Broomfield, CO, Jake still doesn’t eat at these places because of the rest of his food allergies, but I have eaten at both places off their gluten free menus with no problems.  All of us, Jake included, ate at the Chipotle in Louisville, with no problems!  We requested the person on the line change their gloves for us and they were so nice they even washed and scrubbed their hands, even with a line.  We are SO happy to have a place that even Jacob can eat at.

When we haven’t been eating out, we’ve eaten a lot of salads with grilled chicken or grilled steaks.  We’ve also eaten a ton of fava beans this July, we grew some ourselves and also got a bunch from our CSA.

Here’s one fava bean dish we’ve eaten a lot of this summer:

Fava Beans with Basil and Sundried Tomatoes over Pasta

Fava Beans – shelled

Handful of Basil – chopped

Sundried Tomatoes – chopped

Garlic

Onion or Shallot

Olive Oil

Pasta – We use gluten free Tinkyada

Sautee your garlic and onion or shallot in olive oil.  Meanwhile boil your fava beans for 3-4 minutes.  Cook your pasta according to package.  Toss Fava beans, chopped basil, chopped sundried tomatoes, garlic and onion, and a dash of olive oil together.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  This is good warm or cold as a pasta salad later.

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We’ve also grilled a lot of fava beans this summer, which is a nice way to save time on prepping the beans!  Just toss the fava beans in olive oil, salt, and pepper or whatever you want.  We used seasoned salt several times which was tasty.  Then grill for 3-4 minutes per side, until the pod begins to blacken.  I served with lemon juice over the top of them.  Then just let everyone eating shell the beans themselves.  We did this several times outside on our picnic table served with a salad and it was  a lot of fun, a lot like eating edamame at a Japanese restaurant.

This week we have more of Jeremy’s favorite seasonal vegetables.   Not really, but I think we do have some pretty tasty meals planned.  Last week didn’t go exactly according to plan, but we stuck to it for the most part.  The one meal we didn’t make last week was the beet greens with pasta.  And since I’m a couple of days late posting this and planning meals, I pushed that meal out until this week and we ate it Thursday night.   I have to say, it was surprisingly tasty, and even Jeremy who was not looking forward to it at all really liked it and in fact went back for seconds.  It’s even more surprising because we didn’t use pine nuts (Jake is allergic), and skipped the olives.  You will probably notice that I have some repetition on here from last week, we have a lot of similar veggies this week, and we are repeating some of our favorites from last week.

Produce (Our Garden)

Spinach, Turnip Greens, Mustard Greens,Turnips, Kale, Garlic Scapes

Produce (CSA)

Beet Greens, Peas, Beets, Head Lettuce, Shallots, Strawberries, Chard

Meals Planned

Meal 1 – Beet greens with pasta, a big salad, turkey deli meat (I like Applegate farms which is gluten free, dairy free, and casein free)

Meal 2 – Ground pork tacos with head lettuce, refried beans, avocado

Meal 3 – Steaks, a big salad with baked beets and green shallot tops, turnips (the same recipe as last week), and turnip greens

Meal 4 – Breakfast for dinner – bacon, Vans gluten free, dairy free, egg free waffles, and beet rosti (we haven’t tried this recipe before)

Meal 5 – Chard / beet green and black bean enchiladas (I am going to remove the cheese from the original recipe and add black beans…  I’ve never made this recipe before either)

Meal 6 – Pasta with spinach, artichokes, and sundried tomatoes and sugar snap peas with shallots

Snacks – Kale chips – set oven to 350 degrees, tear kale up into bite size pieces and toss with olive oil and salt, cook for about 7 minutes or until crispy but not burnt.  (Jake loves these)

Extra meal for leftovers – Mustard greens with rice from Local Flavors by Deborah Madison I’m planning on making this recipe without the rice and then freezing the greens for nice side with Asian dishes.

I didn’t mention the garlic scapes or shallots much, but the garlic scapes I chop up and use in place of garlic when a recipe calls for it and the shallots I use in place of onions.  Our farm gave us spring shallots that have not been cured and they have green tops just like onions.  We’ve been using the green tops just like you would green onions, and they taste about the same.

Now, off to make dinner!