pesto-veggie side dish

to me this is just about the best side dish for an improvised bbq night... this weekend the weather has been over the top here, so we have spent as much time as possible out in the small garden. we ended up improvising a bbq, and one dish I really would like to share with you is this super easy pesto-veggie side dish. it goes well with almost all meats and/or sausages, takes maybe 15 min. to prepare if you go for the easy version using a store-bought pesto, and therefore fits perfectly for an improvised bbq night.

basically it is a selection of veggies roughly cut, blanched, and while still steaming hot they are mixed with your favorite pesto. this time I used about four carrots, two leeks, a cauliflower and mixed with a store-bought pesto Genovese.

if you have time, or just happens to have homemade pesto available that will lift this dish even higher, but when time is a priority a good store-bought pesto is fine. the dish will be delicious with a great variation of vegetables, so the selection can be done based on what is in the fridge, what looks good together or maybe which veggies the children prefer... a little bonus is that it is a very children friendly dish to prepare, as the children can help both select, wash and cut the vegetables, the dish is done before they lose interest, and they get to bring a contribution to the bbq...

banana - blueberry morning...

part of todays breakfast

with two small children we are usually up at the very crack of dawn and today was no exception... in the weekends this means that we have extremely good time for having a nice slow breakfast, something we all enjoy. right now it is the season for Norwegian blueberries, and as we all were out picking (and eating) some last weekend, this morning called for banana - blueberry smoothies as part of our breakfast. I like to be able to, in such a simple way, to demonstrate to our three-year-old that the origin of food isn't the grocery store...
today  I used two frozen bananas, 100 g of blueberries (also from the freezer), a little vanilla and some natural yoghurt, gave everything a good blending, and it was done!
when I have very ripe bananas I won't get to use I cut them up in chunks and put them in the freezer, I find this a great way to reduce food waste and at the same time I often have bananas for smoothies at hand. as a bonus the smoothie is both creamy and ice-cold.

cauliflower soup and corn chips

main ingredients

nice warm cauliflower soup with corn chips and a little lemon juice

also little hands enjoyed the soup

today has been nothing but rain here and I really feel like soup... it is still summer though, so dinner ended up being a light cauliflower soup inspired by this recipe. as I know this is a soup liked very much by all of us, I made a large portion and froze half of it for a busy day with no time to cook... a great thing about this soup is that you can serve it with almost anything... bread, parmesan, chicken, bacon or as today, corn chips and lemon juice. This version is made from two rather large organic cauliflowers, two cloves of garlic, two potatoes, a bit of freshly grated ginger, vegetable broth, nutmeg, olive oil and lemon juice. I cut all the vegetables into appropriate pieces, seared them carefully, including garlic and ginger, in olive oil, and then added water and vegetable broth. for this version I added about two liters of fluid. when the potatoes are done I used my beloved Bamix, and gave the soup a good blending. finally I added grated nutmeg, salt, pepper and lemon juice to taste and served it with a little extra lemon and corn chips.