Food, Glorious Food

Have you seen Ice Age: The Meltdown? Whenever we watch it, the boys can't stop singing "Food, Glorious Food" just like Sid! And indeed, food is one of our family's favorite topics. We love everything about food, from going to the farmers market and chatting with the farmers about their veggies to searching for new recipes, cooking together, and, obviously, eating. My boys are pretty good eaters and are almost always willing to try something new.  

We have long been fans of local veggies, and in the past, we've gotten vegetables from our favorite CSA, but this summer, we have been enjoying visiting the Urban Harvest Farmers Market and the Pershing Middle School Garden Stand. Last weekend, we even came across a West U resident selling garden goodies on his front lawn. You know we had to turn the car around to get some dinosaur kale! 

Here are some snapshots of what we've been eating this week:

Gene bakes bread (often multiple loaves) almost every weekend. (I am so lucky!) This was a batch of delicious whole wheat pita that he made on Saturday afternoon.

We gobbled it up with some chicken kebabs (or sha-bobs, as Henry calls them), rice, grilled summer squash, onions and peppers, corn on the cob, and sliced tomatoes and purple carrots. We had picked out all the veggies at the farmers market that morning. It was a delicious meal!

For lunch on Tuesday, I whipped up a quick summer corn salad using corn and tomatoes from the farmers market (you don't even cook the corn, so it comes together in minutes!).

We ate it with market peppers, leftover pita and our favorite hummus (Grandma's hummus, which we stock up on at Whole Foods).

I found purple hull peas at the Pershing garden stand and chatted with the gardener about how she likes to prepare them. I modified the recipe only slightly, but she was right: purple hull peas are delicious! We ate them with fresh cornbread, sliced garden tomatoes, and a dinosaur kale and carrot salad. It was the perfect light summer supper, and my favorite meal of the week!

And you already know that this little boy loves to be in the kitchen. We still love reading books about food, finding recipes at the back, and cooking up a fun meal. We've made the pancake recipe from Hey, Pancakes! a couple times now and the boys love it. I follow the recipe exactly except for using about half whole wheat flour instead of all AP.   

Will eats his pancakes with butter and syrup, and fruit on the side, but Henry and I like ours topped with peanut butter, banana slices and chia seeds. I also threw on a bunch of local blueberries!

We are also loving all the summer fruit at the farmers market. Last weekend, we picked up a watermelon, a cantaloupe, blueberries, figs, and peaches. 

Gene thinks I'm slightly obsessed with local produce (okay, I am), but I say I'm just raising good, healthy eaters with an appreciation for food, glorious food and where it comes from!