Late Summer Cooking

I have to imagine most home cooks are pretty inspired this time of year. Fresh (and local) produce is abundant and its a good time to squeeze in those last summer meals (deviled eggs anyone?)

There have been lots of yummy eats around here, in fact I spent quite a bit of Labor Day weekend in the kitchen. Some highlights:

Vinegar glossed chicken with polenta and fresh green beans from our garden. The best part of this dish is the vinegar, which marinates for several hours with garlic and rosemary before its used to deglaze the pan at the end. High on flavor, though my cutting up a whole chicken into parts skills are severely lacking.

These ones are repeats from one of my favorite food blogs, Dinner a Love Story. Baked Chicken with Creamy Tomato Sauce and White Bean and Tomato Soup (picture from DALS.) My book club went gaga for the baked chicken dish when I brought it for a leftover lunch. Last night I made the soup with smoked bacon from a local Amish farm. Talk about deep flavor. Yum.

I often focus on side dishes when the meat is more standard (BBQ chicken, pan fried pork chops, etc.) These were all good.

Zucchini fritters (picture from Smitten Kitchen) on Jennifer's recommendation. I added more green onions and made the lemon-garlic sauce.

Salt & Vinegar Roasted Potatoes I will repeat this one all fall.

Beans and Tomatoes This marked the first time I cooked beans from scratch. I've used dried beans in crock pot recipes, but never cooked the beans for other recipes. I used half the bag in this recipe, then froze the rest.

Last but not least, a sweet treat. I upped the health quotient in these Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies by switching out 1/4 of the oats for flaxseed meal. A nice chewy addition. What I like about these is that they use half the amount of butter, sugar and chocolate chips than traditional recipes.