Tortellini With Lemon & Herbs

Tortellini with fresh herbs, originally uploaded by shannon_turlington.
Last week I posted a wintry pasta dish, so this week I am countering with a pasta that is all about summer. This sauce is light and tangy, perfect for a hot summer night, especially if you can use herbs right out of your own garden. It pairs [...]

Quick and Easy but Elegant Party Food

Yes, the party season is winding down, but here’s a dilemma that can come up at any time: What do you do if you want to be social and have people over, but you don’t want to spend a lot of time cooking beforehand? I know that as I have gotten more and more pregnant, [...]

Tomato & Bread Salad

Tomato and Bread Salad is a resourceful way to turn day-old bread and an abundance of summer tomatoes into something delicious. This is actually one of my favorite salads, one I could eat every day for lunch during the height of tomato season.

Although bread salad, called panzanella in Italy, is most often associated with Italian [...]

Mediterranean-Style Roasted Vegetable Salad

Are you overrun in garden goodness? Then try this salad. It was a big hit at our house and is chock full of delicious veggies. While I made it with eggplant and squash, I think it might also take well to additions or substitutions of tomatoes and sweet peppers. A little bit of roasted chile [...]

Roasted Red Pepper & Yogurt Dip

Another big-time party is coming up, so time for a couple of dip recipes to hit my blog. This dip is a very pretty coral color, super-easy to make, tangy and really good. It goes well with crudites and pita chips. No one will ever guess you used yogurt (yuck!) for the base. (Actually, I [...]

Roasted Vegetable Salsa

When it’s wintertime and you’re missing fresh salsa, this can be a more-than-acceptable substitute. The seasonings I give here provide a Mediterranean flavor, and I like to serve this salsa as part of a mezze with pita chips. If you want a more Latin-style salsa, use hotter chilies and substitute seasonings like lime juice, vegetable [...]

How to Make Hearty Soup

Soup is one of the easiest and most satisfying things to make. Almost anything goes when it comes to soup, and if you make a lot of it, you will have lunches for days, or you can freeze it and have ready-made dinner for the next week. Here is the basic formula for making pretty [...]