Blueberry Melon Salad

July is National Blueberry Month, among other things. I tend to associate blueberries with August (specifically August 1), but I will never turn down blueberries any time. They are just so good!

When my family went on a picnic the other day, I had already made a fruit salad, but when I came upon this one, I thought, what the heck? I was already making two pasta salads, why not two fruit salads as well? You can never have too much food for a picnic, after all.

Blueberry Melon Salad with Thyme

1 c. stevia
1/4 c. water
Juice from one lemon
4 sprigs of thyme
3 c. each cantaloupe, honeydew melon and watermelon, cut into chunks
One pint of blueberries

Mix the fruit together in one large bowl. In a small pot over low heat, mix the stevia, water and lemon. Stir until the stevia has dissolved. Remove from heat. Once cooled, pour over the fruit and mix well to coat. Refrigerate.

Enjoy!

Not Until Mr. Frodo Has Had Something To Eat

Today is J.R.R. Tolkien's birthday. It is a day that cannot go by without watching at least ONE of the LOTR movies. I chose Return of the King. What is it about third installments in trilogies: Return of the Jedi, Return of the King - both my favorites. I guess it has everything to do with the fact that the good guys do win.

Of course, I can't miss the opportunity to eat something decidedly Middle Earth-ish. This year I went with

Hobbit's Favorite Soup

Olive oil
One bunch of green onions, chopped
3 stalks of celery, sliced
6 c. water
2 vegetable bouillon cubes
Salt and Pepper
2 t. each dried thyme and rosemary
1/2 t. anise seeds
3 bay leaves
Potatoes, cut into chunks (I used five large potatoes)

In a large pot, saute the green onions and celery in the oil until softened. Add water and bouillon cubes, potatoes, and pepper and herbs. Bring to boil, cover and simmer until potatoes are soft, about 30 minutes. Puree a few ladlefuls in a food processor and return to the pot. Serve. Enjoy!

If I'd had time, a loaf of homemade bread would have made this awesome! Something crusty, I'm thinking. As it is, I made up a simple leafy green salad and store bought sliced bread to accompany it. We sat around our new dvd player that holds 5 dvds at a time, loaded it with the extended version of Return of the King and pushed play.

Yes, this is what I call living the good life. Good food, great family, fantastic movie.

Scarborough Fair Meatloaf

Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

With apologies to Simon and Garfunkel and its possible 1670 origins, it was this ballad that came to mind as I was making this meatloaf.

Scarborough Fair Meatloaf

2 stalks celery, chopped
One onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
One block of firm tofu, frozen and thawed, drained and crumbled
1/4 c. walnuts, chopped
12 oz. vegetarian meat crumbles
1-1/4 c. quick cooking oats
3 T. Braggs Aminos
2 T. ketchup
1 T. Dijon mustard
2 t. parsley
1/2 t. each - sage, rosemary and thyme

Saute the celery, onion and garlic until soft. In a large bowl, add the sauteed vegetables and remaining ingredients. Mix well.

Here's where I confess my sins.

The original recipe said to spray a loaf pan, but this made more than my loaf pan would hold, so I sprayed a casserole dish instead. Dumped it all into the dish,  covered it with a coating of ketchup and baked at 375 for one hour.

Came out tasty, but definitely not a loaf. More of a hash. We dished it on top of the mashed potatoes and gobbled it up. Not sure how to make this more loafy - my son suggested going ahead with the loaf pan and maybe pressing it down a bit to compact it. Not sure if that would work, but we liked it well enough for me to give that a go. If anyone has a suggestion, or has tried the packing technique and it works, let me know, would you?

My non-vegan cousin teased me about using the term *meat* in the recipe, but another friend pointed out that the word *meat* is defined as the the edible part of something as distinguished from its covering (as a husk or shell), so can be used to describe both plant and flesh. So there!

The word meat comes from the Old English word mete, which referred to food in general. The term is related to mad in Danish, mat in Swedish and Norwegian, and matur in Icelandic, which also mean 'food'. The word "mete" also exists in Old Frisian (and to a lesser extent, modern West Frisian ) to denote important food, differentiating it from "swiets" (sweets) and "dierfied" (animal feed).