Surprise!  Summer Fest is still on!  Response and participation have been so great during the last five weeks, we decided to extend Summer Fest through mid-September and then roll right into a Fall Fest.  We’ll even have a fun new Fall Fest pumpkin badge thanks to Matt of Matt Bites! Visit Margaret at A Way to Garden for all the new details and schedule.

This week we’re celebrating peppers, both sweet and spicy.  I decided to try my hand at pickling some hot peppers since I happened to have a basket of serrano chiles sitting on the counter (I picked them up for a dollar at the Farmer’s Market last Saturday).  I love pickled jalapenos, but I always end up using the store-bought kind.  I thought it would be nice to have some home-pickled peppers on hand for once!  And since I won’t go through them very fast on my own, one basket of peppers seemed like the perfect amount to pickle.

Since I’ve never pickled peppers before, I wanted to start with some sort of recipe.  I found a couple in books, and several online, but finally decided on Michael Symon’s recipe at Michael Ruhlman’s blog. It was simple and easy to adapt to my small amount of peppers.

First, I washed the peppers and poked each of them in a few places with a knife (the idea to pierce them with a knife came from David Lebovitz’s version).  Then I packed them into jars.  One basket of peppers (about half a pound) filled three half-pint jars.

Next I made the brine.  I used equal parts white vinegar and water, sugar, salt, garlic, coriander, cumin, and black peppercorns.  I had planned on using bay leaves, but at the last minute, I couldn’t find mine!  Oh well, I continued without.  I boiled the liquid then let it simmer for ten minutes.

While still hot, I poured the brine over the peppers, filling the jar completely with liquid.

Next I put the lids on the jars, let them cool, then placed them in the fridge.  They should be ready in about a week, but will continue to improve as they sit.  From what I hear, they will last a very long time in the fridge.

You’ll just have to wait to hear how they taste!  In the meantime, you should make some yourself.

More Recipes Featuring Peppers:

• Roasted Red Pepper Hummus
• Peach and Peppadew Salsa
• Feta-Stuffed Peppers from Seriously Good
• Sausage, Peppers, and Smoked Mozzarella Panini from Panini Happy
• Black Bean and Pepper Salad with Cilantro and Lime from Kalyn’s Kitchen
• Roasted Green Peppers from Chocolate & Zucchini

Other Summer Fest Attendees Celebrating Peppers:

• Alison at Food2: Making Hot Pepper-Infused Tequila
• Michelle at Cooking Channel: A Peck of Perfect Pepper Recipes
• Kirsten at the FN Dish: Chiles Rellenos and More Stuffed Peppers
• Liz at Healthy Eats: 10 Ways To Eat Sweet Peppers
• Margaret at A Way to Garden: Oven-roasted peppers, and freezing how-to
• Caroline at The Wright Recipes: Homemade Harissa & Sweet and Spicy Peperonata
• The Gilded Fork: Dossier and recipes on peppers spicy and sweet
• Paige at The Sister Project: Grilled Tomatillo Salsa with Jalapenos
• Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Consuelo’s Hot Chile Sauce and Hatch Chiles
• Alana at Eating from the Ground Up: Homemade hot sauce, and why gloves are a good idea
• Cate at Sweetnicks: Summer Panzanella
• Food Network UK: It’s Chili Weather

How You Can Join in Summer/Fall Fest 2010

Have a recipe or tip that fits any of our weekly themes? You can contribute to our online recipe swap in various ways, big or small.

Contribute a whole post, or a comment—whatever you wish. It’s meant to be fun, viral, fluid. No pressure, just delicious. Simply leave your tip or recipe or favorite links in the comments below a Summer/Fall Fest post on my blog, and then go visit my collaborators and do the same.

The cross-blog event idea works best when you leave your recipe or favorite links (whether to your own blog or someone else’s) at all the host blogs. Yes, copy and paste them everywhere! That way, they are likely to be seen by the widest audience. Everyone benefits, and some pretty great dialog starts simmering.

Or think bigger: Publish entire posts of your own, if you wish, and grab the juicy Summer Fest 2010 tomato badge (illustrated by Matt of Matt Bites), or the new pumpkin version he just did if it’s for September 22 onward.

Summer/Fall Fest 2010 Posting Schedule

7/28: Cukes and Zukes
8/4: Corn
8/11: Herbs, Greens, and Beans
8/18: Stone Fruit – I missed this one!
8/25: Tomatoes

9/1: Sweet and Spicy Peppers
9/8: Garlic
9/15: White (or colorful “white”…but not sweet) Potatoes
9/22: Spinach
9/29: Apples

10/6: Fall Salads
10/13: Pumpkin + Winter Squash
10/20: Pears
10/27: “Mad Stash” (as in what you’re shoving in freezer/jars/dehydrator, etc.)

11/3: Root veggies
11/10: Brassicas: incl. Brussels Sprouts, Cauliflower, Cabbage or other
11/17: Sweet Potatoes
11/24: Bounty to Be Grateful For

I bought a delicious Crenshaw melon at the Farmer’s Market on Saturday and after eating a few slices for breakfast yesterday morning, decided to turn the rest of it into melon balls.  I had no particular reason for wanting to do this, it just seemed like a fun thing to do.  And we all know that food tastes better when it’s cut into fun shapes, right?

As I was scooping out the flesh with the antique melon baller that has been in my family for as long as I can remember, I thought about the half-empty container of fresh mini mozzarella balls in the refrigerator.  I had never combined melon with mozzarella before, but the melon balls and mozzarella balls were the same size and shape and the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like they were destined to end up in the same bowl.

So of course they did end up in the same bowl.

I made a quick dressing of lime juice, honey, and mint since I knew those ingredients would be nice with the melon.  I also added a bit of crushed red pepper because after living in Sicily for four years I now put crushed red pepper in just about everything.  And of course a tiny bit of salt always helps to perk things up a bit (try a sprinkle of salt on fresh cantaloupe – yum!).  The resulting salad was light, simple, and delicious!

Melon and Mozzarella Salad

2 cups of cold, bite-size melon balls or cubes (use your favorite type of melon)
1 cup of bite-size fresh mozzarella balls or cubes
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon fresh chopped mint leaves
small pinch of salt
small pinch of crushed red pepper

Put melon balls and mozzarella in a medium bowl.  In a small bowl, whisk together honey, lime juice, mint, salt, and crushed red pepper.  Pour dressing over the melon and mozzarella then toss to combine.  Serve immediately.

Yield: four servings

Related Recipes:

• Blood Orange and Green Olive Salad
• Sweet and Spicy Cucumber Dill Salad
• Chilled Ginger Cantaloupe Soup
• Tangerine and Jicama Salad with Garlic and Cilantro

Around the Web:

• Cucumber Melon Salad from Not Eating Out in New York
• Melon, Chicken, and Avocado Salad from La Tartine Gourmande
• Melon Salad with Prosciutto and Goat Cheese from Closet Cooking
• Watermelon Salad with Feta or Cotija from Simply Recipes
• Cantaloupe Salad with Feta and Basil from Kitchen Parade

The Summer Fest theme this week is tomatoes and I can’t think of a better thing to talk about than slow-roasted tomatoes.  I made these for the first time last September and they were absolutely amazing.  Although I made them a few more times throughout the year with grocery store cherry tomatoes, I’ve been waiting for some good summer tomatoes to roast. Continue reading →

It’s Summer Fest time and this week we’re celebrating herbs, greens, and beans.  My contribution to the party is a simple side dish of green beans dressed in a rich balsamic browned butter sauce.  It can be thrown together in minutes and has an extremely short ingredient list, but don’t let that fool you.  The flavor of these green beans will blow you away! Continue reading →

For the rest of the summer, my Wordless Wednesday posts will be replaced by Summer Fest 2010 – a cross-blog food event that celebrates the beautiful fruits and vegetables so readily available from home gardens and farmer’s markets at this time of year. The event is in its third year and I’m thrilled to be a part of it for the first time this summer.  Thanks to Margaret Roach and Deb Puchalla for creating this fabulous summer blogging party!

Each Wednesday for the next five weeks a group of us will be sharing tips and recipes centered around a specific garden theme.  There are several bloggers participating, new friends and old, and we will be linking to each other and encouraging you to share your favorite tips and recipes as well.  It’s a big celebration of summer produce and you’re all invited! Continue reading →

Here is a look back at a Sicilian recipe I posted a few years ago that is one of my all-time favorite pasta dishes.  While it might seem too hot right now for a heavy cream sauce, I crave pistachio pasta all year long.  It’s so simple and quick, the sauce will be finished by the time your pasta is cooked.  Pair it with a crisp salad and I think it’s a great way to end a long summer day.

Farfalle with Pistachio Cream Sauce Recipe

While I haven’t always been a huge fan of beets – I swore they tasted like dirt when I was a kid – I will always eat them pickled.  To be honest, I’ll eat almost anything once it’s pickled (I still won’t eat pigs feet), but pickled beets are especially good thanks to the natural sugars present in the bright red root.

While there are tons of recipes for pickled beets out there, I want to share my Aunt Kathy’s method for pickling beets.  It’s simple and the results are absolutely delicious.  She douses the cooked beets with vinegar, seasons them with salt and pepper, and stores them in the fridge.  It’s really that easy.  The sweet and sour beets are a wonderful addition to salads, but I also like to eat them alone as a snack. Continue reading →

Happy Food Blog Friday!  This is my absolute favorite zucchini bread recipe and I’m thrilled to be able to share it with you today.  Heidi from 101 Cookbooks calls this her Special Zucchini Bread and with extras like lemon zest and poppy seeds, it truly is special.  Continue reading →