How to make a cantaloupe smoothie. Would you believe, just take a ripe cantaloupe and toss it in the blender? It’s that easy and unbelievably creamy for 100% fruit.

No labor required to whip up a Cantaloupe Smoothie but Happy Labor Day (or Labour Day, Canadian readers!) Weekends to All! This recipe is so quick and easy
that I'm adding it to a special collection of easy summer recipes.
Watch for new 'summer easy' recipes all summer long.
With a free e-mail subscription, you'll never miss a one!
Friday I sniffed it
in the grocery store,
turned it
in my hands, looking

for bruises

in the rough, webbed rind.

My mother's voice—the one

I carry always in my head—pronounced it fine. Ripe,

but not too soft.
- excerpt from “Cantaloupe”
by poet Lee Robinson
via Writer's Almanac PUBLIC SERVICE MESSAGE:ALWAYS WASH YOUR FRUITS and VEGETABLES!Always, always wash the exterior of melons, other fruits, vegetables and all fresh produce, even if the skin won’t be eaten.W…

Another recipe for a quick supper, shrimp and scallops in a milky broth, with barely cooked tomato, corn and my favorite vegetable this summer, okra.
Don't like okra? No problem, green beans are great too! Come August, my northern soul longs for cooler climes. This year, a week in British Columbia was penciled in, then erased. Then a heat wave descended upon Missouri, temps climbed into the high 90s for weeks on end. My garden wilted, I wilted.So I was okra-green with envy when friends headed to northern Michigan earlier this month, packing up cooking gear and garden vegetables for ten days at a family cabin Anne (readers know Anne as the Pastry Whisperer of Flaky Tender Pie Crust fame, St. Louisans know her from Kitchen Conservatory, St. Louis' great kitchen store and cooking school) has been visiting since she was a girl.Some times Anne blogs about the relaxed cooking that happens in a summer cabin on a northern lake. This year, her fish and sausage chowder appeared in my …

Oh my, what a combination, the freshest summer corn and the ripest summer tomatoes. This simple Fresh Corn & Tomato Salad is simple in name but much more than the sum of its parts, a classic summer dish. Save this easy recipe for the very best garden-fresh tomatoes and corn.
COMPLIMENTS!
"We gave it an A+ the first night and an A [the second]." ~ Charlie This recipe is so quick and easy
that I'm adding it to a special collection of easy summer recipes
published every summer since 2009.
Watch for new "summer easy" recipes all summer long.
With a free e-mail subscription, you'll never miss a one!
Suddenly it is August again, so hot,
breathless heat.

I sit on the ground

in the garden of Carmel,

picking ripe cherry tomatoes

and eating them.

They are so ripe that the skin is split,

 so warm and sweet

from the attentions of the sun,

 the juice bursts in my mouth,

an ecstatic taste,

and I feel that I am in the mouth of summer,

 sloshing in the saliva…