My dear friends, Barb and Kim, made the most delicious food for Marissa’s bridal shower. Kim made four different bruschetta and Barb made a beautiful salad and savory tarts.

I didn’t get any photos of the individual dishes, so I’ll do the best I can cropping from the few buffet photos I do have, my apologies ahead of time because the photos won’t do the recipes justice.

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I served this salad on Christmas. I think it’s one of the prettiest salads around. It is inspired by a photo I saw on Pinterest.

Easy and Pretty. Now that’s a nice combination!

Fruit & Cheese Green Salad Wreath with Lemon Poppy Seed Dressing

Salad

• 1 small head iceberg lettuce
• 3 cups mixed greens
• 1 cup baby spinach leaves
• 2 small bunches grapes (red and/or purple)
• 1 small red and 1 small green apple (1 cored and cubed and 1 sliced)
• 2 pears (1 cored and cubed and 1 sliced)
• 8 Strawberries (3 left whole for decorating, the rest diced)
• 1/2 cup dried cranberries
• 1/2 cup blueberries
• 1/2 cup crumbled Gorgonzola cheese
• 1/4 cup sliced almonds

Dressing

• Zest of 1 lemon (remove zest and set aside before juicing lemon)
• 1/3 cup lemon juice
• 1/3 cup agave nectar
• 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 2 tablespoons minced red onion
• 1 tablespoon poppy seeds

Salad: Place the iceberg lettuce and mixed greens in a large bowl and toss to combine. Place a bowl in the center of a large round platter and spread the lettuces around the bowl on the platter. This is your wreath base.

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Here, as promised, is the second salad I served on “Dinner and Cards” night this past Friday.

Another super quick and easy main course salad that is perfect for summer. It is especially easy and summer-friendly if you start with a purchased rotisserie chicken.

I was too lazy (or maybe it was just too hot to make another stop while shopping) to get a rotisserie chicken – since they don’t sell them at Trader Joe’s, which was the only stop I made.

So, I started from scratch and roasted a little organic free-range hen instead.

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Last night, we had George and Julie over for cards and dinner. You may remember George and Julie as the “side vs. salad” couple from the 4th of July party. That’s George sitting on the cool deck and Julie in the blue top on the far right.

We’ve always been a big “cards family.” We play either Hearts, Spades, Rummy 500, Pinochle, or Gin Rummy with my dad nearly every Sunday. So “cards and dinner” is nothing new at our house, but having another couple over for that explicit reason is.

I had family obligations all morning and into the early afternoon, so dinner had to be fast and easy. I made a quick cocktail by whizzing a few frozen mixed berries in the blender with about a cup of purchased lemonade. I strained out the seeds and put the mixture in a pitcher and then added the rest of the bottled lemonade and popped that in the fridge to chill. When it was time to serve, I poured the berry lemonade and an ounce of vodka over ice and topped it off with a splash of homemade limoncello. Cocktail Done!

When Dave got home from work, I asked him to scour the refrigerator for olives and the pantry for smoked fish and pâté and arrange it on a platter with some crackers and grissini breadsticks.  Snacks Done!

Below is the recipe for one of the two salads I made, the other will follow in a day or so.

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Dave, Connor and I spent an hour or so walking around a very small part of the Ballymaloe House grounds.

We searched out and found the chickens.

Hundreds of chickens who were so happy and content with the big bins of fresh kitchen scraps.

Plus oyster, clam, and mussel shells from last night’s dinner.

Chickens need calcium and the grit from oyster shells. If you want to learn more about the reason, go HERE.

As we were walking toward them, we noticed a couple of old trailers on the other side of the fence from the “chicken yard.”

Guess what the trailers are used for?

Chicken Coops!

How brilliant is that?

There was a gentleman in a little red golf cart who was collecting the eggs. All he had to do was open the trailer door, step in and gather the eggs for The Yeats Room and the school.

There are no eggs in this healthy and scrumptious salad recipe from the Ballymaloe Cookery School. It’s a twist on the traditional American Succotash. I love the addition of quinoa and the change from lima beans to chickpeas.

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If you can find Easter egg radishes and colorful heirloom cherry tomatoes at your grocery store or farmer’s market, this perfect colorful summer salad!

If not, I’m sorry for you but it will still taste fantastic without the “fancy” vegetables.

Isn’t it pretty?

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Besides the deliciousness of this old-fashioned potato salad recipe, I also love that when Sheila sent me the recipe she named specific brands of mayonnaise, pickle relish and seasoning salt.

All three of the brands are true Red, White & Blue Americana, all created in the early 1900’s!

Hellmann’s Real Mayonnaise

In 1905, Richard Hellmann from Vetschau, Germany, opened a delicatessen on Columbus Avenue in New York City, where he used his wife’s recipe to sell the first ready-made mayonnaise. It became so popular that he began selling it in bulk to other stores. In 1912 he built a factory for producing Mrs. Hellmann’s mayonnaise. It was mass-marketed and called Hellmann’s Blue Ribbon Mayonnaise. It was so successful, that Hellmann closed his delicatessen in 1917 to devote full-time to his mayonnaise business.

Lawry’s Seasoned Salt

The seasoning was originally created by Lawrence Frank, the original owner of the Tam O’Shanter and Lawry’s The Prime Rib Restaurant, where the seasoning was used and sold to patrons of Lawry’s. In 1938, Lawry’s began marketing its seasoned salt in retail stores.

Vlasic Dill Pickle Relish

Frank Vlasic immigrated from Poland to Detroit in 1912 and started a small creamery with savings from his factory job. His son Joseph acquired a milk route in 1922, which eventually grew into the state’s largest dairy distributor. In 1937, Vlasic was approached to distribute a home-style pickle, later marketing their fresh-packed pickle in glass jars. A star was born!

The mention of a “milk route” reminds me to show you one of my 4th of July “Americana” centerpieces.  Made with three Vintage Milk Dairy Porch Delivery Boxes.

In case you’re too young to know what these are, they are boxes that were left on people’s porches and a milkman delivered milk and other dairy products right to the door. Here is a little history from the Historic New England exhibit – From Dairy to Doorstep.

After World War II, change came to the milkman. The milkman was a familiar character in the neighborhoods of small towns and cities alike, and dairy products now held an unquestioned place in the American diet. Yet, refrigerators, supermarkets, suburban sprawl, and automobiles threatened home delivery. Consumers chose to live in different places and get milk in different ways. In fact, by the end of the 1950s, home delivery fell into a decline and never recovered. By the early 1950s, reliable power refrigeration replaced ice boxes and revised the homemaker’s job of buying and cooking for the household. Perishable foods like milk could now be bought in greater quantity and kept longer without spoiling, more meals could be made from leftovers, and frozen foods could replace fresh. The milkman did not have to arrive every day in order for the family to have unsoured milk.

I am just barely old enough to remember the milkman. These boxes (purchased on eBay) make me really happy!

Speaking of happy – check out this lovely spread of food. The potato salad is in that huge yellow stoneware bowl in the upper left corner. YUM!

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I’ve seen this cool tip for cutting a bunch of cherry tomatoes at one time all over the internet and on Pinterest. I’ve used it for some time now, but keep forgetting to share it with you. It not only comes in handy for this salad but is especially fabulous for THIS RECIPE and any other recipes calling for roasted cherry tomatoes.

Summer Squash and Salmon Salad

1/3 cup olive oil
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 pounds zucchini, ends trimmed and then thinly sliced
2 tablespoons pepper jelly
3-pound salmon fillet, skin on
2 cups cherry or grape tomatoes
6 cups fresh spinach leaves
1/2 red onion, peeled and thinly sliced
2 avocados, diced
1 cup chopped pecans

In a large bowl, whisk together the olive oil and lemon juice, and season with salt and pepper. Add the zucchini, toss to coat and let marinate at room temperature for at least 15 minutes.

Spread the pepper jelly on the flesh side of the salmon. Heat a grill or broiler to high.

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This light summer salad is so delicious and refreshing. An added bonus – no cooking or heating up the kitchen is involved!

One more thing … it’s pretty as a picture.

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Peggy’s ex-husband, Kevin along with his girlfriend, Sushil, hosted a graduation party on Sunday for the kids and for Sushil’s son, Neeraj, who is also a proud high school graduate.

The food was mostly Mexican with a little Indian and vegetarian thrown in. There were chips and Kevin’s famous (and fabulous) salsa, guacamole, queso dip, and samosas for appetizers. Freshly made margaritas, beer, wine, and Samme’s Bloody Mary bar for drinks. And the main meal – I know, that already sounded like enough, but there was much more – including Peggy’s beans and rice, Kevin’s beef brisket tacos, Sushil’s butternut squash tacos, vegetarian and chicken enchiladas, and finally – this salad that Sushil made.

I requested the recipe from Sushil and she told me she found it on foodnetwork.com but made it her own by adding a bunch of cilantro. Good call – it’s another great refreshing summer salad to add to your repertoire.

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