Farmer's Market Cooking?

[tivaclare]

Howdy there folks!

In the interest of wanting to eat better and shop local we are planning on going to the Farmer's Market this weekend. Yah!

I must admit, however, that I'm only an average cook and I NEED a recipe. I may improvise once I have one but I am no good at creating my own recipes from scratch.

Anyone have any good, healthful recipes that are rich in produce/beans? I mostly only do veg as a side dish and would love to feature them more. The same goes for beans, I only have 3 or 4 bean dishes I know how to cook. All of which use canned beans, I'd love to get away from those and start using dry beans (less sodium/cheaper).

PS: Not a fan of cucumbers, as the ones from the grocery always seem to upset my stomach, but I am willing to try them in moderation. What is super weird is that when we lived in Turkey (Air Force) I ate them all the time and had 0 problems. I loved them! Maybe we grow ours differently?

[blossomed]

I have been eating like this since I was a kid - my mom is a veggie girl.

But girl there are volumes of awesome cookbooks on this very subject. Head to your library and check out a few.

Once thing I love and I do think I have perfected the perfect (redentant I know) recipe is pasta salad! Any shape pasta (rotoni, spirals, etc) tomatos, cucumbers (more on this later), peppers, and then 1 cup italian salad dressing. Then the piece de resistance (gee I am french today) is to top with grated pamesan cheese and breadcrumbs just before serving. And I think this salad taste best room temp (not cold out of the fridge).

I also look at menus (like restaurant menus) when making dinner. They really help me to expand my creativity. Fresh salads are great. Spring Mix, topped with all kinds of veggies makes a wonderful salad.

Lima beans and corn this was something my grandma made in the summer and it is delish.

I found a receipe for a tomato pie - I loved it. You may to google that.

Chili (black beans, kidney beans) - in the summer this is good to make chili cheese hot dogs! Not that hot dogs are all that healthy but they do taste good.

Have you ever made hummus - that is garbanzo beans mashed, some olive oil, some garlic, and sesame seed paste (called tahini I think) but I have made it without that and did not notice it missing. Hummus is a great dip on fresh veggies?

Stir fry? Fajitas? Grilled eggplant, squash, zucchini? Look at Indian cookbooks because many of those receipes are vegetarian.

If I get a great deal on a fresh veggie, I just google that and receipe and usually you can find 100 good ones.

On the cucumbers, try the english no seed kind (which may have been what you ate oversees). Or try baby "kirby" cucumbers - they are both gentler on the stomache.

Bon Appetit! (Said in my best Julia Child voice!)

[queenofthehivemomof5]

I like stir fry myself for a main dish with lots of veggies and fajitas too. Plus I sneak in veggies in just about everything we cook.

On the dried beans, what I like to do is cook a big batch of them in the crockpot then put in smaller freezer containers or Foodsaver bags and freeze the cooked beans. Then I can either quick thaw in the microwave or toss the frozen beans into dishes like chili, soups etc easily enough.

[3timesoccermom]

If you ladies lived close to me I would let you borrow my book - Vegetables. I bought it on Amazon for .01 (plus $4 shipping which was reasonable for this huge book) and it's about 3 inches thick and has every vegetable imagineable in it along with recipes for them.

tivaclare - there are many, many different types of cucumbers so you most likely had a different type when you were in Turkey, maybe a "burpless" variety.

These 2 sites have lots of good vegetable recipes - allrecipes.com and tasteofhome.com

I love the search feature on allrecipes. You can specify what you do and don't want in your recipes. Happy vegging.

[Kristen.C]

You should check out some of the Mollie Katzen/Moosewood Restaurant Cookbooks from the library. She's got lots of great veggie recipes of all types- appetizers, salads, soups, sides, main dishes, & desserts!

I find that those cookbooks are the ones I keep going to again and again.

[Betsy33]

Saveur magazine's new issue has a summer produce guide; the whole magazine is about Farmer's Markets. I loooove Saveur and subscribe to it; they have fantastic recipes in every issue from all types of cuisines.

I also agree with the stir-fry option. If you cook from cuisines that use veggies as a main ingredient like Mediterranean countries like Italy, Greece and many Asian countries like China, Japan, Thailand. You'll also tend to use less meat which is good for the pocketbook and might be good for the body, too.

Hillbilly Housewife also put out a summer fruit/veggie recipe article today.

I agree with allrecipes.com, and recipezaar.com is great, too. Good luck! I LOVE farmer's markets.