— Dalene King

Well, you know, cooking seasonally is always a very good thing to do, but, um, I'm thinking summer salads, um, I'm thinking, um, pasta dishes covered with those vegetables. Uh, we talked about making zucchini muffins and zucchini bread and zucchini noodles and other things like that. So I think that, um, the one thing about having an abundance of summer vegetables is that you don't wanna create boredom with everyone. Oh no, not another zucchini dish or, oh, well, we're gonna eating kale again so that you can, um, steam or blanche some of those vegetables and then freeze them. And, uh, that should work, uh, you know, well for you. So, um, there are things like that, um, for some reason, and, and I don't know the answer why, but kale grows very easily for me. So I have kale until, uh, the end of, uh, October. And, um, I never tire of kale and I use it all of the time and eat it practically every day. So, um, there's that, um, I'm thinking of a, the big bounty of, of salad and, you know, go back to batch cooking. This would be a wonderful time to use the roasted tofu recipe and make either some, uh, tofu croutons or some little flanks of, uh, tofu to add to that salad. So there are endless possibilities, and I don't know about you, but when the summer is finally over and I can't go out to my front yard, yes, my garden is in the front of my house and it looks like a flower, a big flower bed, and a lot of people in my neighborhood seem to be doing that now. But anyway, you don't want a tire of anything. And, uh, just enjoy the bounty, share it with friends. And if you are a person who wants the whole world to be plant-based, make a beautiful dish with the zucchini from your garden and take it to your friend or neighbor, and don't use the word vegan or plant-based, and they will tell you how delicious it was. And case in point is, last week at this outing where I made vegan cheeses, I didn't tell anybody, I didn't use the word vegan, I used the word cashew. I said, oh yeah, it's some cheese made with cashews. And everybody was like, oh, I've never had cashew cheese before. Whereas sometimes using the word vegan is really hard for people to hear.