Summer vegetables!

Living in NY doesn't quite provide me with fresh vegetables all year around. I could probably find almost any vegetable and fruit in NY all year around but they would most probably not be locally grown or taste anything like freshly harvested. Although NY summer is the most dreaded season of the year I also love it. There is a huge variety of green markets on Manhattan and the supply of fresh local vegetables and fruits are almost limitless. The taste of a red ripen tomato or freshly picked basil is divine. I was invited to my co-workers house the other day and she send me home with pretty, mouth watering tomatoes, cucumber and figs. 

Mr Gurken, Mrs yellow grape tomato and Miss Red ripen tomato

Before moving to NY I don't think I ever tried fresh figs. Growing up in Sweden i remember only eating dried figs. As far as I remember my first fresh fig was eating two summers ago and it was fantastic. The fig tree is a must in my future garden, side by side with my apricot tree :). When my husband and I visited South Africa at the end of last year I tried green fig preserve, Groenvyekonfyt,    Which was served with Brie cheese, it was absolutely amazing. Important to point out is that this fig preserve tasted nothing, and I mean it, nothing like any fig preserve I have tried so far.

Walnut Pesto:
One of my favorite picnic dishes is pesto pasta salad. It is so easy to prepare and I can add all my favorite summer ingredients and some grilled chicken or spicy salami for protein. My typical pesto ingredients have always been olive oil, Parmesan, garlic, pine nuts and of course basil. I am sure you all know that pine nuts is not the cheapest nut out there but  very important for the pesto. The other day I had bought a huge bunch of fresh basil and wanted to make pesto. I took my pine nuts out of the cupboard and opened the jar. I sniffed and discovered that my precious nuts had gone rancid, I had to throw them out. i revisited the cupboard for alternative ingredient and found a pound of walnuts. I went online and actually found a Walnut Pesto recipe. I am glad (in a way) that my pine nuts had hone bad otherwise I would never have discovered my new favorite pesto recipe. I didn't save the recipe but basically, you would just substitute the pine nuts for the walnuts.