At the Alexandria Markets: We’ve returned to our Alexandria farmers markets after our recent travels, and witnessed that unequivocal sign of seasons changing from summer to fall in the peaches and tomatoes being nudged out by apples, pears, and early winter squash. Now I don’t know if there’s some sort of zucchini shortage in Northern Virginia, but we’ve received none from our CSA this year and I only spotted a few giant ones at the West End market. Has there been some sort of run on zucchini by crazed zucchini bread addicts? (By the way, if you haven’t been to West End lately, you’re missing out on some wonderful authentic Mexican tamales from Alma at Westmoreland Berry Farm.)

At any rate, we received word from our CSA that their tomatoes have begun to show signs of early blight (not the late blight you’ve heard so much about), so I set about to make sure we enjoyed the ones we got to the fullest. After our tomato jam experience (kudos to Jennifer for winning the food52 best preserves contest with her recipe!), the boy comes running to get his knife whenever he sees me dicing tomatoes. He even overcame his fear of the blender to help me make this super simple gazpacho. With all due to respect to José Andrés, who makes the best restaurant gazpacho in town, this recipe is even simpler with just six ingredients, tasting pretty much like, well, a pulverized tomato. Ironically the boy liked it even though he refuses to eat fresh tomatoes. Be sure to use good quality extra virgin olive oil — preferably from Spain, of course.

Recipe: Simple Tomato Gazpacho (kid-friendly instructions)

Ingredients:

• About 2 pounds very ripe tomatoes, diced
• 2 slices white/Italian bread, crusts removed and cubed
• 3 cloves garlic, peeled
• 2 tablespoons sherry or white balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
• generous pinch of sea salt

Instructions:

1. Using a kid-safe knife, assist child in cutting tomato and bread into pieces.

2. Place tomatoes, bread, garlic, vinegar, salt and 1/4 cup oil in blender. Cover and blend for 1 minute.

3. Add additional olive oil as needed, blending after each addition, to reach a smooth consistency. Chill for at least 30 minutes, then serve with an extra drizzle of oil to garnish. (Use basil oil for extra oomph.)

Bonus Foodie Tot Video! This was a totally unscripted, impromptu video shot by the husband so please disregard the messy counter and, uh, my lack of make-up. (And no, Seventh Generation did not provide compensation for the product placement, but clearly we should buy stock or something. ) Anyway, enjoy!

Foodie Tot cooks gazpacho from Colleen Levine on Vimeo.

Part of our local Saturday Supper, this grilled flank steak is simple, quick and perfect for entertaining. Chimichurri is an Argentinian sauce commonly served with steak. With parsley and peppers, it’s a spicier take on the traditional pesto. It also makes a great marinade to add even more flavor to your steak. Cut the grilled steak into thin slices and serve along or on top of a simple salad, or on rice or grains for a heartier meal.

Recipe: Chimichurri Flank Steak

Ingredients:

• 1 bunch parsley, rinsed and coarsely chopped
• 1 or 2 jalapeno peppers, quartered (seeds included)
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1/2 c olive oil
• 1/4 t each of salt and pepper
• 1 flank steak (1 1/4 – 1 1/2 lbs.)

Process first five ingredients in food processor until finely chopped. You may need to add additional olive oil to get the right consistency, but it should be fairly thick. Rub several tablespoons over flank steak and marinate for at least an hour. (Optional, pour 1 bottle dark Mexican beer, e.g. Negra Modelo, over steak as well.) Bring steak to room temperature while preheating grill or grill pan. Sear over medium high heat for 3-4 minutes per side for medium rare, 5 for medium. Allow to stand for several minutes after removing from the grill before slicing. Serve with the remaining chimichurri sauce on the side. Serves 4-6. Enjoy!

Eating local while on the road can be challenging, but visiting the local farmers market is one of my favorite things to do while traveling. As mentioned below, we stopped at the Port Washington Farmers Market on a recent trip to New York, on our way out to some wineries on Long Island’s North Fork.

A Local(ish) (NY) Picnic Lunch: After some terrific wines at Roanoke Vineyards (recently mentioned in the NY Times), it was on to my in-laws’ pick, Palmer Vineyards, where we enjoyed a mostly-local picnic lunch of fresh goat cheese on organic baguette, procured from the market that morning, dried fruit from home, and North Fork potato chips (sweet potato and sour cream & onion). The toddler danced to the live music while we took in the vineyard views from the porch. A lovely summer afternoon!

A Local (NY) Breakfast: On the way back to Queens, we stopped at an organic farmstand, with lovely strawberries and some actual Long Island goat cheese, which we ate for breakfast the next morning. These little berries have a firmer texture than our Virginia berries, and the goat cheese was some of the creamiest I’ve ever tasted. Delicious!

A Local (VA) Dinner: Back at home, we again had garlic scapes in our weekly CSA bag. My new favorite preparation is to toss them with a touch of olive oil and kosher salt, then throw them on the grill. The grilling mellows the flavor, resulting in the perfect complement to some fresh (Fauquier County VA) beef burgers on locally-baked, garlic-rubbed Italian bread. (Then I put non-local organic ketchup on it…homemade ketchup is on my to-do list this summer!)

I got thrown off my food blogging game by our two-day power outage followed by a weekend trip to NY. But we are back and slowly refilling the fridge, so it’s time to catch up!

I wrote previously about our June 1 Del Ray (VA) Farmers Market dinner for Week One of One Local Summer. The star of that dinner was the fresh WV morels. We were a little late to market that week, and as I got in line behind a couple at the Mushroom Lady’s stand, I noticed one last box of morels labeled “Sale! $15.” I waited anxiously as the couple in front of me debated which to pick, and remarked “$15??” when looking at the morels, clearly unaware that those same morels had been $20 the week before. After what seemed like an eternity, they settled on something else and I snatched up the box. Mushroom Lady kindly topped off my pint with a few last stray morels from the box. Per her instructions, I simply cleaned them and sauteed them in butter. They were without a doubt the most intensely flavored mushrooms I have ever eaten. The deep, earthy flavor is hard to describe … suffice it to say that I will not hold off until the end of morel season next spring to pick them up again!

The following weekend we checked out the Port Washington Farmers Market, on Long Island, NY. According to the Local Harvest listing, it is the only all organic market in NY. It was not, however, all local. There was a booth selling Croatian olive oil, and a failure to read the label carefully led to us later opening our “all local” lunch spread and discovering the goat cheese was in fact from Massachusetts. I believe the market was just getting going for the season though, as most of the NY seasonal markets don’t open till June. There was a great Nordic organic bread booth, where we got wonderful cinnamon rolls for breakfast, and the one true farmer had a basket full of beautiful garlic scapes. Here she’s trying to convince a hesitant customer to give them a try.

This was an easy pasta dish made easier with a few Trader Joe’s favorites – cooked, peeled frozen shrimp and Ginger Soy Broth, plus my own prepped and frozen broccoli and garlic scape pesto from last week. I also used TJ’s flax seed pasta to fulfill my Whole Grains Challenge quota for the day. (OK, so it was 1 of 3 meals, but every small step counts, right?)

Ingredients:

• 1/2 bag flax seed fusili
• 3 c ginger soy broth (added to water to boil pasta)
• 1 c frozen broccoli
• 1 bag shrimp, thawed and tails removed
• 2 T garlic scape pesto* (or whatever kind you have on hand)
• 1/2 T olive oil
• 1 t roasted sesame oil
• 1/3 c cashews

Instructions: I added the 3 c of ginger soy broth to the pasta water. Cook pasta as instructed, adding broccoli for final 2 minutes. Reserve cooking water for later. Heat pesto and oils in skillet over medium heat. Add shrimp and cook just a couple minutes, about 3-4, adding cashews for final minute. Toss with cooked pasta, broccoli, and about 1/4 c of the pasta water. Enjoy!

* Recipe: Garlic Scape Pesto

Take one bunch of garlic scapes (3-4) and chop into 1 inch pieces. Add to food processor with 1/4 c olive oil, 1/4 c nuts of your choice (I used cashews, pecans and pistachios are also great), and 1/4 c parmiaggano cheese. Chop till fine. This is pretty potent, so use with care!

Toddler Notes: I believe this was the first time we really served shrimp to the toddler. He wasn’t interested the first night, but ate one bite the second. He ate all his broccoli first and then stole every last piece off the husband’s plate, before getting to the noodles. Hooray for broccoli!

Submitted to Presto Pasta Nights, created by Once Upon a Feast and hosted this week by Closet Cooking.