Sides for your Fourth of July Weekend

July 2, 2014 by 12 Comments

I thought I would pick out some of my recommendations for Sides for your Fourth of July Weekend from my recipe archives.

Well, not all of them are from the archive. This initial one is merely a suggestion and guideline. First, you could start off with a patriotic Red, white, and blue potatoes dish (ok, purple potatoes but close enough) for breakfast. You can do these in a skillet like here, or you can roast them in the oven or even put them on the grill and make it a bbq side if you’d prefer.
Recipe idea for your Fourth of July, red and white blue (purple but close enough) potatoes that you can make on the skillet or oven or grill. Start your day with a patriotic breakfast or make these as a side dish! Vegetarian and very versatile, season to your liking

Season how you’d like- I don’t know if I ever make them the same way twice as I quite liberally open up my spices and seasonings to pull things out and keep tasting until I like it. You’ll definitely want salt and pepper of course, but sometimes I use cumin, or rosemary, or dill, or chili powder, or onion or garlic powder (or I’ll throw actual diced onion or minced garlic in), the possibilities are endless based on what you have and like.

It’s still strawberry season, and these Strawberry and Cheese Bruschettas – either with mozzarella or with goat cheese – just look so elegant and classy.
Strawberry Bruschetta, vegetarian and easy to put together with fresh strawberries, basil, olive oil and balsalmic vinegar, and fresh mozzarella cheese on good bread Strawberry Bruschetta, vegetarian and easy to put together with fresh strawberries, basil, olive oil and balsalmic vinegar, and fresh goat cheese on good bread

More fruit won’t hurt on the table, such as these Prosciutto wrapped Cantaloupe with Red Pepper Lime Oil and Manchego
Prosciutto wrapped cantaloupe with red pepper lime oil and manchego recipe

Besides your fruit, add more vegetables to your Fourth of July weekend with via this recipe for Chilled Vegetable Pizza that can be a rainbow of various colors depending on what veggies you choose and can easily serve a crowd. You can also adapt this version to have fruit instead for a chilled dessert fruit pizza!
Summer Appetizer Recipe: Chilled Vegetable Pizza with dill/chive cream cheese mixture and broccoli, asparagus, baby carrots, red and orange bell peppers, corn kernels!

Upgrade your pasta salad side dish with a little heat as well as with avocados, corn, and Cotija cheese with this Elote Pasta Salad
Elote Pasta Salad - mixing pasta, pan roasted corn, cotija cheese and avocado

This dessert only has strawberry, but no reason you can’t add blueberries or blackberries to complete the red white and blue, and you will be no fool with this Strawberry Fool Recipe  of blended strawberries with cut strawberries and the fresh whipped vanilla cream.
April Fool's Recipe with no Trick: Strawberry Fool Recipe is blended strawberries with the cut strawberries and the fresh whipped vanilla cream (Grand Marnier optional)

If you are making burgers or hot dogs for a group, consider having a variety of cheeses besides Cheddar such as Swiss or Pepperjack (even if you are doing hot dogs!) and also bacon. Not only can you top your burger with bacon, but believe me, I am happy to add it to my hot dog as well.

Besides ketchup and mustard and relish and pickles, for you might consider having little dish where guests can add toppings of sauteed mushrooms, sauteed onions, guacamole, salsa (and your guac and salsa can double to go with chips),  bbq sauce and/or blue cheese (MMMM bbq sauce and blue cheese!).

Also, if you haven’t tried this before, if there are potato chips at the party you are having/attending, try taking a handful and adding them on to your burger or hot dog!

For the fourth of July itself, which falls on a Friday this year so I think everyone is enjoying at least a 3 day weekend, I will not be doing any cooking. In fact, instead I’ll be judging cooking- I will be seated as one of the PNWBA judges at the Dallas Oregon Freedomfest BBQ competition. If you are in the area, they will be holding it in Dallas City Park and you will have an opportunity to sample some of the best BBQ in the Northwest ($1 for 2 oz sample) and a fireworks show that evening too! There should be some great teams because at 18 teams, the competition counts as a qualifier for the national competition.

This means that probably during the weekend, there will probably be at least one dish of bbq mac and cheese with some leftovers from the BBQ competition that I take home!

What are you doing for the Fourth of July? Is there a special dish you are making or looking forward to? Are you going to watch the fireworks live or on TV (I personally like the DC ones!)?

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Potluck Appetizer Recipe: Chilled Vegetable Pizza

August 28, 2013 by 4 Comments

This recipe for a Chilled Vegetable Pizza appetizer was for a weekday wine potluck in August. It was inspired by a photo/recipe on Pinterest from Mom on Timeout for Veggie Crescent Bites, though a guest mentioned that it also looks like a Pampered Chef Cool Veggie Pizza creation, and there is a similar recipe on the Pillsbury site for Easy Crescent Veggie Pizza!

Wherever this Chilled Vegetable Pizza recipe came from, I love the bright colors of the vegetables. And, I love dill, so making this with the dilly cream cheese spread was right up my alley, though I suppose you could up the vegetables by using a vegetable cream cheese, or ranch it up (as in this version at AllRecipes)!

Summer Appetizer Recipe: Chilled Vegetable Pizza with dill/chive cream cheese mixture and broccoli, asparagus, baby carrots, red and orange bell peppers, corn kernels!

You can probably use any base you would like for your “flatbread” bottom of the vegetable pizza, including actual pizza dough, but I followed her lead in pinching together reduced-fat Pillsbury Crescent Rolls. This made two pizzas, and using a pizza cutter I was able to cut about twenty four 3-bite sized square slices from each pizza, so overall this yielded 48 little appetizer bites of Chilled Vegetable Pizza from this entire recipe.

Ingredients:

  • 2 cans of reduced-fat Pillsbury Crescent Rolls, or use pizza dough- including wheat, or a gluten free, your call!
  • 1 package (8 oz reduced-fat cream cheese or neufchatel cheese or tofutti “cream cheese”, softened)
  • 1 cup light sour cream or Tofutti Sour Supreme sour cream substittute
  • 1 tablespoon of chopped dill
  • 1 tablespoon of chopped chives
  • 4 cups of chopped vegetables. Pick a rainbow of colors: I chose broccoli, asparagus, baby carrots, red and orange bell peppers, and corn kernels

Directions:

  1. Combine the sour cream, softened cream cheese, dill, and chives together. You can mix this up the day before to reduce your prep work.
    Chilled Vegetable Pizza recipe: Softened cream cheese, sour cream, chives and dill mixed together. Ok, maybe the cream cheese isn't as soft as it needed to be and I used my arm to further mush it
  2. Same thing with cutting all the vegetables into small pieces. That way, when it came for my get together that evening, I came home from work and just had to really assemble everything, and it took me less than 20 minutes! You can choose how you want your vegetables. For instance, for me the broccoli and bell peppers were raw. But, I steamed the asparagus, cut baby carrots, and corn.
    Chilled Vegetable Pizza recipe: Prepare your choice of beautifully colored vegetables to top your chilled vegetable pizza Chilled Vegetable Pizza recipe: Prepare your choice of beautifully colored vegetables to top your chilled vegetable pizza
  3. When you are ready to make the chilled vegetable pizza, take out the dill/chive cream cheese mixture to let soften again for spreading. Next, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
  4. Open the packages of crescent rolls. Unroll each can (8 triangular pieces of crescent roll) so they become one long rectangular sheet, or you can settle for two square sheets. Make sure that you pinch any of the pre-cut seams between the pieces so that everything will stay together. Put each one on a lined baking sheet.
  5. Bake for 10 minutes, and then remove the two baking sheets from the oven and let cool.  Remove and let cool for a few minutes so you won’t hurt yourself during the next step, which is spreading the dill/chive cream cheese mixture onto the crescent roll sheet.
    Chilled Vegetable Pizza recipe: After baking a crescent dough roll which was rolled out and pinched at the seams, spread the cream cheese/sour cream mixture
  6. Top with fresh veggies. Use a pizza cutter or knife to cut down to appetizer size pieces and serve! I did not refrigerate mine, since I barely finished before my co-host arrived, but you can chill it in the fridge if you’d like.
    Chilled Vegetable Pizza recipe: Veggie Crescent Bites with cream cheese/sour cream/dill and chives on crescent roll and topped with pretty veggies

I suppose I could have fancied it up by grilling flatbread to give it a bit of smoky flavor, and ooo done that with the corn too. But I didn’t. And it was still great, and continues my theme of super easy recipes this summer.

Oooo… or you could make this a dessert version using fruit and crème fraîche or marscarpone… the possibilities!

Summer Appetizer Recipe: Chilled Vegetable Pizza with dill/chive cream cheese mixture and broccoli, asparagus, baby carrots, red and orange bell peppers, corn kernels! Summer Appetizer Recipe: Chilled Vegetable Pizza with dill/chive cream cheese mixture and broccoli, asparagus, baby carrots, red and orange bell peppers, corn kernels!

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