Here is a super easy but yummy summer cake that really you can make anytime. In just a few weeks, we’ll have fresh strawberries at a nearby farm, yet in the middle of winter, frozen ones serve equally well. I never would have thought of this myself, but it’s light, delicious and great for a quick dessert. From my grandmother’s common sense kitchen.

2 cups or 1 pint of fresh/frozen strawberries
1 box yellow cake mix
1 tub store-bought vanilla frosting

If using fresh strawberries, be sure to wash, remove stems and any bad areas. If they are large, cut them into bite sized pieces. Maybe consider keeping half a handful to slice for decorating the top later, but not at all necessary.

Grease and flour the bottom of a 9×13 cake pan. Scatter strawberries along the bottom. Mix cake batter according to directions on the box and pour over strawberries. Bake as directed and frost when completely cool.

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This one has been in my “recipes to try” file so long that I no longer remember where it came from. Glad I finally did though!

3 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 1/4 lb hot Italian sausages
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
4 large garlic cloves, finely chopped
3 green bell peppers, cored, seeded and cut into thin strips
28-oz can diced tomatoes
2 cups water
1 cup uncooked small pasta (tubetti, ditali or shells)
5 sprigs fresh basil and 5 sprigs fresh mint, tied together in a bouquet garni
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

In a large skillet with a lid, heat the olive oil over med-hi heat. Add the sausages and onion; cook, turning the sausages to brown all sides, until the onions are just tender, about 8 minutes

Add the garlic and bell peppers and cook another couple of minutes.

Add the tomatoes, water, pasta, basil, mint, salt and pepper (make sure the pasta is submerged). Raise the heat to high and cook until the liquid starts to boil. Turn the heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until the sausages feel firm and the pasta is tender, about 25 min.

Cut the sausages into slices or leave whole for serving.

Notes:
Not being able to decide whether the kids could handle hot or mild sausages, I opted for the garlic as I know that is a taste they like. Browning the sausages with the onions howver were causing the onions to burn, so I separated the sausages into a skillet until brown then added them back to the onions.

3 bell peppers seemed a bit much, so I reduced that to 1 really big bell pepper. Oh, and I chopped it into bit instead of strips. The smaller they are when you start cooking, the fewer “what are the green things?” questions at the dinner table.

I added a can of tomato paste with the diced tomatoes and left out the cup of water as I boiled the pasta separately. To me, sauces like this are always better after a lot of simmering, so that’s why I left out the pasta. I let this one “bloop-bloop” – aka simmer – for an hour and a half. Left out the mint too, as my poor plant is slow to get going this spring.

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2 avocados
2 cloves garlic, chopped
the juice of ½ of one lemon
small onion, minced
1 tomato, seeded and diced
salt and pepper to taste

Scoop out avocados. Add garlic, squeeze lemon, and mash until smooth. Add tomato. Stir, then season to taste. Cover if not serving immediately!

Notes:
I frequently half this recipe, depending on how loud the tummy rumbling is or if we are having guests. We serve this with Tostitos nacho chips warmed in the oven, cheese melted over top. Lately we’ve also had it in a wrap sandwich with turkey and sprouts and inside steak fajitas.

Who is Zoltan you might ask? His whole title was Zoltan the Adequate, and he was a very nice entertainer at a Renaissance fair. He had a rat, and between shows, Mecandes somehow got a conversation and this yummy recipe out of him.

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