I would serve a homemade tomato tart, fresh green salad, iced tea, and fresh fruit, maybe with thin cookies - good ones purchased or homemade. I can supply the tomato tart recipe and make-ahead slice n' bake cookie recipe if you want.

Teresa

With this heat, I'd make a salad with chicken and fruit similar to the appetizing one Linda ( doucanoe) posted on WFD and chilled minted pea soup.

The soup is easy. Just cook some chopped celery and leeks or onions in chicken broth until soft. Add a bag of frozen peas and cook until done. Cool slightly, add chopped fresh mint and puree in a blender or food processor or use a stick blender. You can blend in some milk, cream or yogurt but I usually just add enough to get a nice texture. Serve chilled or warm.

I might have chicken salad on either a crescent roll or artisan bread. Plate it with some fresh grapes/fruit. Ice tea or lemonade and maybe a cheesecake for dessert.

Second choice might be she-crab soup and ceasar salad.

Quiche served with a mixed green salad or cold gazpacho soup.

Tomatoes here aren't good enough for gazpacho yet....that would be my august or September menu...

Probably a chicken salad of some sort...maybe with pecans and pineapple bits, fruit, likely a melon slice with some raspberries because they are so good now, and a muffin.
Home made lemon icecream for dessert.

Or I might make a fritatta with broccoli, green onion and a little tomato for color, fruit and grissini.

Or perhaps chilled potato soup with a side of grilled shrimp on a skewer, and fruit and a lemon bar for dessert?

One time when a friend said lets have lunch...I'll stop by at noon and we can decide where to go....so I scurried around and made a spinach salad with hard boiled egg, bacon mushrooms and a sweet hot dressing and focaccia warm from the oven....and apple cake from the freezer for dessert!

Salad with whatever caught my eye, fresh sauteed steelhead trout, some kind of bread, perhaps corn muffins, a decadent dessert. Ice tea. Maybe that ricotta cheesecake from the weekends paper. Someone posted it here, I had saved it too.

It was me who posted the ricotta cheesecake from USA Today's Sunday Magazine courtesy of Ellie Krieger!

Here is a link that might be useful: Ricotta Cheesecake

"...some fava beans and a nice chianti."

;)

Naturally, you ladies try to impress each other, but if
it were a guys get together the menu would be
baloney sangwiches and bear, (beer). And everybody
would be thrilled.

All kinds of good ideas here. I guess I just needed to be sure that whatever I have will be okay. A cold soup is appealing in the stupendously hot weather that we have been having. The Ricotta Cheesecake sounds like a winner.

lbpod, maybe I will invite a guy over for lunch. It would be a lot less bother.

Teresea_nc, please post your tomato tart recipe. Thanks.

ML

I love serving Ina's roasted veggies with orzo salad. It makes a nice lunch with "something".

Jasdip, someone brought that to my house for a dinner once. It was great.

Fresh Tomato Tart

use a 10-inch tart pan with a removable bottom

basic pastry crust for 1 pie shell
8 oz. mozzarella cheese, shredded
2 TB chopped fresh basil
4-5 ripe fresh tomatoes, sliced 1/2-inch thick
1/2 t. salt
1/4 t. fresh ground pepper
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

more fresh basil for garnish

Heat oven to 400 F. Line the tart pan with the pastry. Spread cheese over the crust. Top cheese with the basil, then cover tart with the sliced tomatoes, arranging the slices as evenly as possible. Sprinkle with the salt and pepper. Drizzle the oil all over the top of the tart.

Bake 30-40 minutes. Garnish the slightly cooled tart with more of the basil, torn or chopped. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Very light and elegant! A nice dish for lunch or a light dinner when it is hot outside.

Enjoy, ML and all!
Teresa

I'd take it as an opportunity to make that "Summer Torte" by whatever her name was, Burros?? Miriam???? You know the one, it's basically a cake with fruit on top!

Seven layer dip with baked tortilla chips
Margaritas or Sangria
Grilled salmon with pineapple salsa
Latin style potato salad (with a lime/cilantro dressing, I posted the recipe in last month's "New Recipe Review")
Green salad with cucumbers
Torte
Iced coffee if desired

Lpink, I don't know how I missed that potato salad recipe. I just looked it up and it sounds fantastic. Love that it's not mayonnaise-y like most. Barnmom, you make me laugh!

A caprese salad or panzanella salad (ina's), a piece of fish and a cookie would make me happy.

Sorry I butchered her name, it's MARION Burros, cookbook author, and here's the recipe:

Summer Torte by Marion Burros
Originally posted by Jojoco, such a great cook!

1 stick butter, softened (I always use unsalted)
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup flour; sifted
1 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
pinch of salt
fruit of choice; sliced into wedges (I used about 7 plums. Peaches, nectarines,strawberries all work great and in combination)
cinnamon sugar for top

Preheat oven to 350. Cream butter and add sugar. Beat well. Add eggs and beat. Mix together flour, baking powder and salt. Add to batter. Mix. Spoon globs to greased 9 or 10 inch springform. Use a knife to spread batter to cover entire pan. Arrange fruit on top. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar (amount depends on the sweetness of the fruit).
Bake for 45 min.

I must admit that I like to top it with streusel in addition to the fruit, or at the very least some of those big sugar crystals (I use "Sugar in the Raw" for this).

Teresa,

I'm saving that one for tomato harvest time.

Jim

Thanks for those yummy recipes! Perfect for this time of year.

Hey, Jim, are you saving that one for tomato harvest time? (grin)

Me too.

Annie

I would serve a steak salad. I broil a small filet rare, then chill it and slice it into skinny curls. The salad is spinach, romaine, pickled beets, dried cherries, sweet onions sliced in rings, black olives, sometimes boiled egg, toasted slivered almonds, and topped with a fig or pomegranate balsamic. You can add oil also, but I usually skip it cause I don't want the calories. It is also lovely to buy some edible flowers for the top to dress it up. then top it with the steak curls. Some good crusty bread, A nice iced tea or summer cocktail and lemon cream sandwiches for dessert. Darn, I am getting hungry.

Annie LMAO! Enjoy Jim and I mean that in all honesty. I love tomato tarts.

Oooo, yummy, Sherry. Thanks for that.

Jimster -- enjoy your tart, enjoy your tart, enjoy your tart.

I make something very similar to Teresa's tomato tart, but I use ciabatta bread, sliced in half lengthwise, instead of a pastry crust - the rest of the ingredients are the same, although sometimes I spread garlic butter on the bread first and sometimes I use part Provolone or Asiago cheese. I have lots of tomato plant seedlings (I think), and so I hope some of them produce tomatoes. I also have basil seedlings that should be ready at the same time. I've noticed that if I plant them in June, I get a very nice late harvest in September or October and some of the plants will last into the winter. So my harvest time will not coincide with Jim's.

At this time, I think I would make a Crab Louis salad or a Crab Asparagus soup, depending on the weather.

Lars