Seasonal Sundays: Suppers That (Almost) Cook Themselves

Grab a pencil because this week's "Seasonal Seven" recipe collection is all about making life just a little bit easier, dinner-wise, that is, during an oh-so-busy season. I hope you'll find one or two destined as "keepers" in your own recipe repertoire.

~ Skip Straight to the Good Stuff ~

Welcome to Seasonal Sundays ...

As always, thank you for inviting me into your InBox. I do so hope to kickstart your food imagination for the coming week ... PS And if you like this week's recipes, perhaps you'll share this newsletter with a friend or social circle? If you forward this message, others may subscribe for free right here. Thank you!

Well, hey! I gotta say, every year, this period between late Lent and early summer gets me every.dang.year. First Communions. Easter Gatherings. May Day. Proms. Mother's Day. Graduations. End-of-School Stuff. The May Long Weekend. Memorial Day. Getting Herbs & Plants into Pots and the Ground! Prepping Outdoor Stuff for Summer. Switching Out Winter to Summer, Closet & Kitchen. Long Walks with the Dog on Pretty Days. Late Lingering Outdoors.

Same?

As I write, it may be Minnesota-style drippy wet and cold but by Monday, a Missouri-pretty spring shall return.

But enough about the weather.

Except that yeah, for seasonal cooks, what we cook is directed by weather. Also time. Also budget. Also energy.

So for this week's collection of recipes, I threw all those features up in the air and just like that, whoah, this week's / month's suppers are just as fetching as spring's azalea and astilbe and alyssum.

C'mon. Let's make this the best spring yet!

Just a reminder, click any food photo to navigate straight to the recipe's page, it's especially handy for all of us who do most of our browsing on our phones.

In Praise Of ...

• ... the frog chorus which arrived at dark the day the pool opened, perhaps an old cover makes said pool more pond than pool at the moment


• ... small mobs of high school girls dressed in sweats (but not long out of braces, hello such pretty smiles) who buy up all the flowers at Trader Joe's to craft bouquets for spring prom ... no corsages and boutonnières? apparently!


• ... new iPhone and iPad cases after upgrading sooner than later in attempt to get ahead of tariff pricing for both the devices themselves and their protective cases; I love both of these, especially the wallet-style case for my phone which has slots for four or five cards such as ID/payment/medical/AAA/etc; I've used this style case for a good four or more years and just love it; here you go iPhone 16 Pro leather wallet-style case & iPad 11th generation leather case and stand (affiliate links)


• ... the first iris! I'm especially pleased about a big new bed I put in in front last year with bulbs from our great-niece who really worked hard digging up and separating much-overdense bulbs in their new house, can't wait to see what colors they are!

Democracy Matters

The country needs calm, thoughtful and assertive voices amid the chaos inflicted by a minority hellbent on taking/retaining generational power by strangling democratic principles and equal rights. None of us have to personally change the world. We just have to do our part. Pick one thing for the top of your To Do List this week. And then? JUST DO IT.

How're we all doing? Really? The onslaught is huge, thank goodness for important judicial wins, thank goodness for the big turn-around wins in Canada and Australia.

I'm sorry to admit but it's real, I've lost some momentum here. I've missed three protests, one for good reason, two for not. I've stopped making calls. I'm keeping up but as I heard some say recently, "I'm waiting for the CliffsNotes."

This cannot last. The center cannot hold. Tomorrow is a new day. I (think) I'm on it.

ISO Advice ...

A great-niece is getting married this summer. I remember J. back to her goofy preteen years, all bright and fun and also ... yep ... awkward with braces and thick glasses. Fast forward a dozen+ years and she's a product manager at Nike, drop-dead gorgeous, super-athletic and as nice as any person can be. And her fiancé is from St. Louis, that means, someday in the not too distant future, they'll return to St. Louis (this is a big St. Louis thing, guys know that when they marry a St. Louis girl, they'll be moving back someday) where her extended family is filled with aunties and uncles and many cousins and many cousin kids. (Think not one but four flower girls!) I just know, her wedding will be a highlight of our summer. But it's black tie and I'm perplexed at the right look for a woman my age, mid 60s, classy but comfortable, fun but age-appropriate. Anyone have a dress you've just loved? Or a place where you've shopped for a dress you love?

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THE SEASONAL SEVEN: Suppers That (Almost) Cook Themselves

For this week's recipes, I aimed for recipes with warm-weather flavors and combinations that are ...

• ... quick to make with everyday ingredients, for sure
• ... cover a range of proteins, from chicken to beef to pork to seafood and fish but yeah, meatless / vegetarian too, of course
• ... budget friendly, naturally

• THE RECIPE Easy-Easy Hummus Salad Another Quick Supper, just a light, loose hummus topped with chickpeas, fresh summer vegetables and feta. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Simple Lentil Salad with Seasonal Vegetables A concept recipe for a supper salad. (PIN This)

• THE RECIPE Lemon & Asparagus Pasta Light and bright for spring.
• ANOTHER TAKE Pesto Pasta Primavera Another Quick Supper, so many veggies, not much pasta. (PIN This)

• THE RECIPE Southwestern Chicken Taco Salad Plates A summery Quick Supper, no cooking required, just assembly. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Easy Margarita Chicken A quick supper from a surprising source.

• THE RECIPE Easy-Easy Broiled Salmon with Olive Salad Just three ingredients, on the table in 20 minutes. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Salmon with Crispy Crust Moist, flaky fish topped with a golden bread crumb crust. (PIN This)

• THE RECIPE Cold Shrimp in Creamy Dill Sauce with Capers Shrimp in a "creamy" dill sauce that tastes much richer than it is.
• ANOTHER TAKE Warm Baked Feta & Tomatoes with Shrimp The TikTok phenomenon plus shrimp. (PIN This)

• THE RECIPE Slow Cooker Shredded Beef Tacos So handy to have on hand!
• ANOTHER TAKE Twenty-Minute Taco Bar Start to finish, start to feast. (PIN This)

• THE RECIPE Simple French Eggs Simpler than omelettes, light, airy, delicious.
• ANOTHER TAKE French Scrambled Eggs Eggs cooked slowly with a few vegetables, creamy and soft. (PIN This)

Still Hungry? Recipe Collections with More Ideas

• THE COLLECTION Quick Suppers, a Kitchen Parade specialty where dinner is easy on the budget, the clock, the waistline and the dishwasher.
• QUICK SUPPERS ARE JUST ONE CATEGORY IN Recipes by Course, super-organized, of course.

• THE COLLECTION Easy Summer Recipes Less Cookin', More Livin', that's the summer motto. (PIN This)

• THE COLLECTION Easy Egg Recipes A collection of thrifty egg recipes. (PIN This)
• Egg Recipes from Kitchen Parade, super-organized to find exactly what you're looking for.

• THE COLLECTION How to Make a Meal with What You Have: Select Recipes for Cooking from Your Fridge & Pantry (PIN This)
• A RESOURCE FOR How to Save Money on Groceries (PIN This)

What's Brand-Spankin' New?!

Wondering about a recipe from the last while? Check Recent Recipes from Kitchen Parade and Recent Vegetable Recipes from A Veggie Venture.

• THE RECIPE Easy Pesto Pasta Salad Serve warm now with an easy protein, or chilled later for a side dish. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Pesto Pasta Primavera Another Quick Supper, so many veggies, not much pasta. (PIN This)

• THE RECIPE Lemon Cream Pie An irresistible balance of tart and tangy, sweet and creamy. One slice may not be enough! (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Brown Sugar Lemon Curd My Canadian family's signature recipe. (PIN This)

Join Me? Pie of the Month Club

Anyone up for pie? Fingers crossed!

It's been seven years since baking almost 100 pies for #PieDayFriday. But last week, I passed that milestone! It's kinda fun. People really do love pie!

Now a pie a week is nuts a lot. But maybe one a month is both aspirational and do-able? Let's give it a shot.

The #1 Rule: There are no rules except make a pie. Make my suggested pie or not. Make your own crust or not. Make it a sweet pie or not. Make it on Friday or not. You get the idea ...

Here is May's suggested pie.

• Like my late father and very-much-living husband, I'm tempted by "cream pies" but unlike them, I prefer a creamy pie with something sour going on — and this pie promises just that. I make it with both tequila (not much, nobody's getting tipsy here) and mezcal, both are excellent. You just might love this one too ...
• THE RECIPE Easy Margarita Pie Tastes just like a good margarita!

May: Reader Favorites

• THE RECIPE Laura's Healthy Carrot Soup Creamy without a drop of cream. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Paleo Carrot Soup Quiet-inducing, spoon-clinking good.

• THE RECIPE Party Asparagus with Aioli Great for parties, buffets, composed salads. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Asparagus Tapenade A bright green spread for crackers, sandwiches, pasta, steaks, "scoops" and more. (PIN This)

Trending NOW ...

• TEN THINGS I Love About Our New Kitchen What we did, why we did it, what we love, what we've changed. Now updated after ten years! (PIN This)
• BUT THEN THIS Laundry Room Refresh on a Budget What we did, why we did it, what we love, how it streamlined our laundry routine. (PIN This)

• THE HOW TO Asparagus & Woody Ends (Step-by-Step Photos & Video) (PIN This)
• THE A-Z RECIPES Asparagus Recipes Soups to salads to suppers and still more, the whole collection. (PIN This)

May: Recipes Lookin' for a Little Love

• THE RECIPE Best Quick Tomato Salsa (Red Salsa) For chips, tacos, burritos, eggs & more. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE My Guacamole Restaurant-style guacamole, our house recipe. (PIN This)

• THE RECIPE Jicama-Mango Salsa with Chipotle Summer's new salsa, an alluring combination of crunchy jicama and sweet mango.
• ANOTHER TAKE Slow-Roasted Tomato Salsa Smoky with flavor. (PIN This)

The Kitchen Parade Almanac: Looking Ahead ...

• May 5 (Monday) - Cinco de Mayo
• May 11 (Sunday) - Mother's Day & Wear the Hat, Dammit: A Mother's Day Essay
• May 19 (Monday) - Victoria Day in Canada & parts of Scotland
• May 26 (Monday) - Memorial Day in the U.S.
• June 1 - Alanna's Unofficial First Day of Summer
• June 15 (Sunday) - Father's Day
• June 19th (Thursday) - Juneteenth
• June 24 (Tuesday) - Midsummer
• July 1 (Tuesday) - Canada Day
• July 4 (Friday) - July 4th

• THE COLLECTION Cinco de Mayo Mexican-style recipes for spring celebrations with a latin flair.
• FUN FOOD PROJECT Deep Mexico: Ingredient-Driven Mexican Meal Prep A concentrated effort to combine food shopping, meal planning and meal prep techniques into good eats and good fun. (PIN This)

• THE COLLECTION Mother's Day Seasonal recipes to celebrate moms and all who mother.
• AND ANOTHER Father's Day Seasonal recipes to celebrate dads and all who father.

Looking Back ...

THIS WEEK, YEARS PAST
• 2020 Early May (Week 19), another 2020 time capsule, "And so the virus divides us again ..."
• 2021 Rest in Peace (Week 19)
• 2022 Cinco de Mayo (Week 19)
• 2023 Strawberry Season (Week 19) (PIN This)
• 2024 Reveling in Rhubarb (Week 19) (PIN This)

RECENT WEEKS
• Easter Gatherings (Week 16) (PIN This)
• Sweet & Savory Strawberries (Week 15) (PIN This)
• Spring Asparagus! (Week 14) (PIN This)
• Save Room for Dessert, Spring Edition (Week 13) (PIN This)
• Green Food, Just for the Fun of It (Week 12) (PIN This)
• Pasta You'll Love (Week 11) (PIN This)
• Fish for Lent & Spring (Week 10) (PIN This)
• Everyday Cajun (Week 9) (PIN This)
• Winner Winner, Chicken Dinner (Week 8) (PIN This)
• Sweet Little Somethings (Week 7) (PIN This)
• Spinach for Any Occasion (Week 5) (PIN This)
• Project Cooking (Week 4) (PIN This)
• Feeding Our Vegetable Cravings (Week 2) (PIN This)
• Best of 2024 (PIN This)

Soups & Salads When Summer Is Sooooo Close But ...

Here in the middle of the country, May is so pretty and so very, very green with an endless carpet of green grass and most trees near full leaf. Perennial flowers pop out of the earth and are growing by an inch or more, every single day. The bed of greens (chard, spinach are doing great this year) is the source of supper salads, every single day. But really, summer vegetables are only available at the grocery store plus a few hot-house operations at the farmers market. What's a seasonal cook to do?! This is why I spent a year gathering all of A Veggie Venture's best soup and salad recipes into easy-to-scan month-by-month collections.

• DIVE INTO THE COLLECTION Seasonal Soup & Salad Recipes for May especially as spring turns to summer, tons of ideas from A Veggie Venture.
• BUT REALLY, DON'T MISS Gorgeous Raw Asparagus Salad An easy salad made with thin spears of raw (yes raw!) asparagus tossed in a simple vinaigrette.
• OR THIS Deep Mexico Carrot Soup with Tomatillo & Lime Served hot or cold, either way it's gorgeous.

Good to Know!

• THE INFO Never Buy Fresh Herbs Again How to grow a few favorite fresh herbs at home, the soil, the planting, everything you need to know.
• AND WHEN IT GOES WELL? DIY Dried Herbs (How to Dry Fresh Herbs in the Microwave)

Silly (But Fun?!) Food Holidays

• May 5 — Oyster Day (Oyster Stew)
• May 5 — Totally Chipotle Day (Strawberry Vinaigrette with Chipotle)
• May 6— International No Diet Day (Magical Breakfast Cream from "French Women Don't Get Fat")
• May 7 — National Roast Leg of Lamb Day (Lamb Roast with Greek Lemon-Oregano Potatoes)
• May 8 — National Coconut Cream Pie Day (Coconut Cream Pie)
• May 10 — National Shrimp Day (Easy Shrimp & Noodles)

The Best No-Recipe Recipe I Made This Week

Asparagus + Cabbage + Red Pepper + Feta+ Fresh Dill = an Excellent Chopped Salad

Just keep chop-chopping until you have enough veggies, then dress lightly. This week I used a less mayo-y version of the How Sweet Eats House Sauce, just mayo, 2 kinds of mustard, a little honey, a little BBQ sauce. Super easy and good, a bit less spicy than our favorite Comeback Sauce.

Trader Joe's Test Kitchen

This week, without much expectation, especially for $.99, I tried the "canned" lentils at Trader Joe's. Really? They're fabulous. I like them way better than the Trader Joe's more expensive refrigerated cooked lentils which have a short shelf life.

PS I wonder if they could be used for this??? Best-Ever Lentil Salad

PPS Hint, hint. Pick up a can or two or three for something new headed your way shortly ...

A Quick Peek Into a Real-Life Kitchen

Just so you know, everything's not all pretty pictures around here, in the background is a pile of dirty dishes. And just like many (all?) of us, come five o'clock, I too draw a blank about what to make for supper, despite so many recipes I so dearly love. Here's a quick peek from this week.

• THIS WEEK When the cupboard is bare, there's nearly always something that can be used for supper, humble though it may be. As long as there are milk and eggs, I love the challenge of scrounging around for dinner for a few days before hitting the grocery store. This week, we had exactly three corn tortillas, an end of cotija cheese, the bottom of a container of sour cream, a can of beans. I used up some on-the-edge tomatoes and a couple of Gumby-soft cauliflower pieces plus an onion for a vegetarian filling. Oh my. So good!
• THE RECIPE Oaxaca Tlayuda (Mexican Flat Tacos) Easy, healthy build-your-own crispy baked tortillas. (PIN This)

Just Updated!

• THE RECIPE Hot Cross Buns Sweet buns traditional for Easter, rich with spices and citrus. (PIN This)
• ANOTHER TAKE Armenian Easter Bread The buttery sweet bread called choereg or choreg. (PIN This)

Something to Read

I've read American author Anne Tyler since she wrote The Accidental Tourist in 1985. I love how she explores family, relationships and the quiet complexities of everyday life.

Three Days in June is her latest novel, a short one, just 176 pages long -- or 4 hours, if you're a book listener like me. There are just two main characters, a woman and her long-divorced husband, their daughter who is being married, and her own mother. It's lovely ...

• THE BOOK Three Days in June (affiliate link) by Anne Tyler


• NO TIME TO READ? How I Read 4X More This Year Than Last What I gave up, how I read so much, what I read.

Don't Be a Stranger ...

I'd love to hear from you. Comment, send me a quick e-mail (my current address is in the FAQs), dot-dash in Morse code, build a fire for smoke signals, launch a message in a bottle, send a Christmas letter, get the dog to yip, toss me a note wrapped in a rubberband, write a message in the sky, scratch a note in the sand, listen to a seashell, tuck a question into a plastic Easter egg, whatever.

• Any advice for Seasonal Sundays?
• Just one thing that would make it more useful for you?
• Anything else? Chime in, chat away.

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Kitchen Parade is written by second-generation food columnist Alanna Kellogg and features fresh, seasonal dishes for every-day healthful eating and occasional indulgences. Quick Suppers are Kitchen Parade favorites and feature recipes easy on the budget, the clock, the waistline and the dishwasher. Do you have a favorite recipe that other Kitchen Parade readers might like? Just send me a quick e-mail, you'll find my current address in the FAQs. How to print a Kitchen Parade recipe. Never miss a recipe! If you like this recipe, sign up for a free e-mail subscription. If you like Kitchen Parade, you're sure to like my food blog about vegetable recipes, too, A Veggie Venture. When you make my recipes, I'd love to know your results! Just leave a comment below or better still, on the specific recipe's page.

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