Who doesn’t love the sights and smells of a great and local farmer’s market? I have been taking my daughter to the Boulder Farmer’s Market on Saturday mornings, and we are giddy with excitement to see all of the fresh tomatoes, spinach and herbs on each corner stand. But I tend to get ahead of myself and overbuy on fruits and vegetables, scrambling to find delicious and creative recipes at the last minute. And if your gardening has been successful this year and your seedlings have turned into blooming and edible veggies, you might also be looking for some new ways to cook up produce this summer. If this sounds like your summer dilemma, I want to share a few of my favorite fruit and vegetable recipes with you.

I have mentioned 101cookbooks.com in a previous post, but I think it is worth noting again. 101cookbooks.com is a great site to explore many different types of recipes and cooking techniques. You can search recipes by ingredients such as asparagus or spinach, or search by course such as soups or appetizers. This orzo super salad recipe is chock full of summer fresh asparagus, broccoli, cilantro, cucumber and avocado. If you are like me during the winter months in Colorado, this is the type of salad that you will be craving to eat fresh next February!

For most of us, salads are much more appealing during the summer months. But salads can be a nutritional nightmare if you choose unhealthy toppings or dressings. So consider getting more creative at home, and trying to replace high saturated fat salad dressings with a homemade, healthier choice. Take this Vegan Caesar Salad from Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s cookbook, Veganomicon. We made this salad at home a few weeks ago, and it turned out really good - the taste is as close as you will get to a real Caesar salad. We enjoyed this tofu-based salad dressing so much that we continued to use as a cracker/vegetable dip.

Do you have too many avocados sitting on your kitchen counter? The easiest way to use (and devour) avocadoes is to quickly whip up a bowl of guacamole. Since guacamole happens to be #1 favorite food, I have tried many guacamole recipes, and this one by Barefoot Contessa continues to be my all-time favorite. I think the secret to her guacamole is found in step #2—be sure to first spoon out the avocado, add the other ingredients and then chop up everything in the bowl. This allows the avocados to remain nice and chunky, but you still incorporate all the other flavors of red onion, lemons, hot sauce, and so on.

If you are familiar with Eating Well magazine, you know the publication contains beautiful photos and delicious, healthy recipes. And their website is very similar. I recently had a few too many tomatoes and not much time to prepare them. So I found this five-minute recipe for baked parmesan tomatoes. A little parmesan, olive oil, salt and pepper can turn your leftover tomatoes into a colorful side dish.

Do you have any favorite recipes for your farmer’s market produce? If so, please share them with us and let’s continue to support our local agriculture!