The Rest of This Week's Dinner Ideas

Melting a bit in the heat, I'm finally getting back to planning for the rest of the week, when it's unfortunately not so easy to take the time to grill outside. At least everything will be quick and mostly seasonal, as befits midweek summer cooking. So to start, tomorrow we'll have a simple fajita dinner using the great chicken fajitas I picked up during my sweep through Lucky's Market yesterday (where I also loaded up on organic peaches and grapes at astoundingly low prices, plus some wonderful fresh wild salmon, as detailed here). The side will be a big plate of lettuce (organic at $1 a head at Whole Foods) garnished with tomatoes, avocado, bell pepper, and jicama, everything topped to taste with some salsa and nonfat plain yogurt.

It might be hot out, but we can't get away with a week without pasta in this house, so with organic zucchini just $1 a pound at Whole Foods, I'm thinking zucchini, corn and basil fusilli with bacon, originally from Gourmet magazine. This would be ideal with local corn, and lo, Munsons Farm's website says their farmstand at 75th and Valmont is now open! (It wasn't yet open when I stopped by there earlier this week.) They do say that their corn is limited at the moment, so I won't totally count on it yet.

Then, looking for a rice dish, we'll fall back on a favorite for this time of year, sausage risotto with spring greens, from Bon Appetit. The chicken sausage will come from the sale at Sprouts, and there are so many options now for the greens. Sunflower has organic spinach at 99 cents a bunch or organic kale or chard for $1.50 a bunch, and I bet Cure Organic Farm has their beautiful braising mix in the fridge at their farmstand at 75th and Valmont, where I'll already be across the street to check on the corn at the Munsons stand. Such a great time of year to play with this dish.

Finally, we need one more quickie midweek dinner, which will be either sauteed pork loin chops or an experiment with prepared chicken cordon bleu, both on sale at Sprouts ($2.99/lb for the chops, $3.99/lb for the chicken). Baking potatoes hastened by zapping in the microwave, plus more of our wonderful seasonal greens will complete the sides.

And that will do it for this exceedingly warm week. Stay cool out there.