Asparagus, Goat Cheese & Lemon Pasta with Pine Nuts & Chives

This week our chives and Asparagus are ready for harvest. Was perusing Pinterest and came across this one--WOW! I steamed the asparagus and had it warm, but it is also just as good cold. I used rainbow penne which turned this dish into a colorfully springy dish, perfect for a potluck or get together. I could make and eat this over and over!

https://food52.com/recipes/33791-asparagus-goat-cheese-lemon-pasta-with-pine-nuts-chives

Cherry Gelatin Supreme

I found this recipe and decided to take a break from Pumpkin to test as a potential Christmas family dessert recipe. I was able to test it on a neighbor who gave me thumbs up. It's a simple dish ingredient wise, but has multiple chilling steps. It was also a weird size dish so i broke it up into (2) 8x8 disposable pans which worked out pretty well. Worth the effort.

https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/cherry-gelatin-supreme/

Cucumber Tomato Salad with Lemon Poppy Seed Dressing

With cucumbers and tomatoes pouring out of the garden, I am really having fun creating a new cucumber-based salad every other day. I enjoyed this one probably more than the hubby because I would rather have a sweet than savory sauce. It was refreshing and a great salad for summer.

https://www.theslowroasteditalian.com/2016/07/cucumber-tomato-salad-recipe.html

Lemon Zucchini Bread

It's also Zucchini season and in the hubby's grand tradition of gardening, we have more than enough. The hubby is actually the one who sent me this one. It was really yummy. I will say the icing is the key to extra lemony taste. I will say I should have doubled or tripled the amount of lemon in the bread. I also like that this particular recipe only made one loaf which is great for just 2 people so it can be freshly made often.

https://tastesbetterfromscratch.com/lemon-zucchini-bread/

Lemony Cucumber Couscous Salad

So the hubby is wanting to eat healthier (aka, Gallbladder cleanse diet) and we have an abundance of Armenian cucumbers in our garden. I knew he loved lemon and couscous so I found this recipe. What I loved about it is that couscous takes less than 10 minutes to prepare. I let it cool down before adding the mixture of cucumber, garlic powder, parsley (dried), lemon juice (doubled) and, since I didn't have feta, I added some goat cheese and yogurt for a super amazingly delicious salad. It was good both warm and cold and was the perfect complimentary for the scallops. Kudos to this author for sharing this recipe. I will likely be making this over and over!

https://www.budgetbytes.com/lemony-cucumber-couscous-salad/

Mountain Dew Cake (modified)

Well, you all know baking is my therapy and this weekend has been extra "therapeutic". Having fun trying some new recipes. This one was simple and easy. My recipe selection usually starts with something I have in my cupboard that needs to be used. This time it was lemon cake. I usually end up doing poke cakes, but I saw the title and knew I had to try it. A few caveats--if using a bundt cake pan, there are some great tips on YouTube that I recommend watching. Secondly, I didn't have Mountain Dew on-hand, so I used Sierra Mist; I highly recommend adding a little lemon juice to the cake and the glaze--takes away some of the sweetness. Lastly, I recommend making this cake the night before and glazing the next day to make sure it's had time to completely cool down, otherwise you end up with a glaze moat around your cake. Great cake for spring!

https://cookiesandcups.com/mountain-dew-cake/

Lemon Supreme Pie

I was excited to make this one, however, I'm not able to comment on the finished product. I loved both the made-from-scratch lemon curd and the cream cheese layer, but, since I made this for a neighbor as a "get-well" treat, I hope it turned out yummy. I cheated and used a pre-made graham cracker crust instead of baking a pie crust--it saved me a ton of time and seemed to go well with it. I also omitted the extra whipped topping and just left the 2 layers. If you want a quick, easy (but overnight) pie, this is perfect for spring, Easter and summer. I am hoping to make this one again later this season. I love Taste of Home because I know I can always trust their recipes.

https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/lemon-supreme-pie?pmcode=&_cmp=Holiday&_ebid=Holiday3272018&_mid=206673&ehid=dfef5f62f666e299097ce5854fb7aea035676b6b

Ahi Tuna

Friday nights are date night, which is usually stay home, cook a higher end dinner and watch a movie. This week, the hubby bought ahi tuna steaks. This marinade was so delicious. I added a little pepper and we had Beet and Russian Kale With Goat Cheese (a recent addition to our household recipes) on the side instead. I added some rice to the rice cooker. Thumbs up!

http://muybuenocookbook.com/2015/08/seared-ahi-tuna-salad/

Lemon Blueberry Zucchini Bread

It's the month of Zucchini and I always get excited to see what Pinterest has for me each year. I literally started with the first and have been working my way down. This was one of my favorites. I even forgot to put in baking powder and baking soda the first time, but still enjoyed the zingy, albeit dense, bread. If you ask me, there is nothing like the flavor of blueberries and lemon in a sweet bread. I'm planning to try it again this weekend, because, of course, I have much more zucchini to experiment with. [You know it's a good one when the neighbors make it too ;) ]

https://therecipecritic.com/2016/07/blueberry-zucchini-bread-lemon-glaze/

Lemon Basil Chicken

I was so excited to make this recipe. We harvested lemon basil from the garden for the first time. I used this recipe, added kale instead of spinach and ended up using chicken thighs instead of breasts. I paired it with cheesy broccoli rice (at the hubby's request). This was one of the most flavorful pan recipes we've had in a while. Definitely keeping lemon basil in the repertoire.

http://www.wellplated.com/lemon-basil-chicken/

Red Russian Kale with Garlic and Lemon

Let the games begin. Daily, we've been harvesting lettuce for awesome salads. However, today was Russian Kale day. We've had too much, I had to use Pinterest to decide what to do. I actually used 2 different recipes (see next post). Jason loves a similar dish with chards, so I replicated it with Russian Kale. I added mushrooms and red onions as per our usual. It was very nice. Not as pungent as chards. A very tolerable super food. :)

http://salu-salo.com/red-russian-kale-with-garlic-and-lemon/

Fluffy Lemon Pudding Dessert

Yep-you guessed it, this is another pudding recipe that needed to happen. I won't say this one is my favorite, but then again, lemon pudding isn't either. I ended up adding lemon juice to the pudding mix which helped alot. I also added fresh blueberries to the top. The hubby enjoyed it, although he doesn't plow through pudding desserts unless they contain chocolate ;)

http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/fluffy-lemon-pudding-dessert

7-Up Salad

I've been playing the Monopoly game at our local grocery store and one of my game pieces won me a bottle of 7-Up. We hardly ever buy 2 liter bottles of soda, but I decided it would be fun to go down memory lane and make a version of mom's 7-up salad. The recipe I found was very traditional. My mom always put walnuts in hers, but both of us omit the cottage cheese. We also us lemon jello. It's a very refreshing dessert and seemed a good pairing for our Easter weekend traditional steak, baked potato and green beans (with bacon and apple cider vinegar). It's the first time trying this for the hubby.

http://www.food.com/recipe/7-up-salad-31680

BLUEBERRY LEMON POKE CAKE

I have an addiction to poke cakes--I even have an entire Pinterest Board dedicated to them. They're so easy to make but do usually require a few hours planning for cooling and refrigeration. It's a great way to use up cake, pudding and jello mixes. This one was part of a list of 15 (of course now added to my Pinterest board). I had some fresh frozen blueberries that I thawed out. [Blueberries are one of the most resilient fruits when it comes to freezing and thawing.] I purchased the lemon curd, but next time I'll plan to make it from scratch. Although the cake was delicious and refreshing, it seemed liked it would be the perfect treat after a summer bbq.

http://www.thewholesomedish.com/blueberry-lemon-poke-cake/

Lemon Chicken and Spaghetti Squash

My dad posted this on his Facebook yesterday and I immediately decided that's what was for dinner. I ended up adding mushrooms, basil, oregano, mixing it all together and putting it back in the squash "boat" and adding mozerella on top baking for another 10 min at 400 degrees. Also used chards and kale instead of spinach. [I usually cook my squash in 1/2 inch of water in a 13x9 pyrex to keep them moist for about an hour at 375 degrees].

It was definitely worth it! Delicious and healthy!

https://www.buzzfeed.com/melissaboyajian/this-lemon-chicken-and-spaghetti-squash-is-soooo-good?utm_term=.et4nGa2Da

Paleo Lemon Chicken Kale Soup

End of the week food inventory....Chicken breast, lemons, kale....Pinterest....Aha! I found (on my own board labeled "Bucket List:SOUP" this recipe. For more bulk (and goodness), I added some frozen zucchini and yellow squash (from our garden). The recipe actually says it's creamy because they use a food processor for the onion w/olive oil. I skipped that step because I like chunks of onion in my soup. I also only put in 2 cups of broth and the frozen veggies, chicken and salt help liquify for just the right amount of juices. It's sometimes hard to judge because the hubby doesn't like his soup too "soupy". Since we're not strict paleo'ers, I probably would have added cornstarch to thicken if need be but it turned out great! I purposefully chose a night when the teenager wasn't home because this dish IS earthy (and delicious to us old folks). :D  Bon appetit!

http://www.primalpalate.com/paleo-recipe/autoimmune-paleo-creamy-lemon-chicken-kale-soup/