Summer Weekend Freshness – Canada Day Long Weekend

Canada Day long weekend seems to have snuck up on me. I guess I’ve been a bit distracted by what’s going on around me, here in Calgary. As they say though, the show must go on.

I’m always really happy when I can look in my fridge and find things that I can ‘use up’ in another dish. I remembered that I had leftover fregula from my Lamb Meatballs this week and I was pretty sure the little pasta balls would make a great start to a pasta salad. All I had to do was open the crisper and chop up some cucumbers. I also diced some tomatoes up to throw in. I’ll have to photograph the steps involved in the way I do this. I always ‘seed’ the tomato according to a method I learned when we were in Thailand. After the tomatoes are diced, I salt them well and let them sit on the cutting board for a few minutes while I get the other ingredients ready. The tomatoes get thrown in last. The sprouts in the salad also came from my kitchen counter sprouter and some of the herbs, parsley and chives from my garden outside. I love summer! To finish off the salad,  I made a balsamic dressing because the family is nuts about balsamic vinegar.

During the summer I often have odds n ends of various fruits in the fruit bowl. When I need to use it all up, the best way to do it is to make a fruit salad. It is one of our favourite summertime desserts or breakfasts. This time I had an amazing cantaloupe (rock melon for you Aussies!) and some amazing BC cherries.

They were so juicy!

I also added a bunch of grapes and some organic BC strawberries. Of course when I found the whipping cream in the back of the fridge, I had to use that too.

If kid number two wants to be a hand model, he’d better trim those nails more often!