Summer foods

Zach and I were invited to a BBQ for a friend's surprise birthday party, and of course wanted to participate in making the food! What's better as a side dish of potato salad? I found a recipe on allrecipes.com (http://allrecipes.com/recipe/new-red-potato-salad/detail.aspx). It was so easy! Just cut up red potatoes, and boil them until soft.

Mixed up all of the ingredients before adding the potatoes. These included eggs, mayonnaise, white distilled vinegar, green onions, celery, salt, and pepper.

And here it was after chilled in the fridge for a couple hours. It was really delicious, and paired well with all the food at the BBQ!

Last week, we also made some frozen yogurt. Normally, I don't eat too much ice cream, but since it has been so hot in Pasadena, I felt like it would be a nice treat. I flipped the recipe booklet that came with the ice cream maker, and decided on chocolate cherry frozen yogurt.

Here are the ingredients:

9 oz bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, cut into 1 inch pieces

1 1/2 c whole milk, heated to a simmer

4 c lowfat vanilla yogurt

1/3 c granulated sugar

1/4 c maraschino cherry juice

1 c drained maraschino cherries, roughly chopped

Place the chocolate in a food processor. Pulse to chop. Add the warmed milk, yogurt, sugar and cherry juice, and process until smooth. Refrigerate well for 2 hours.

Here is my mixture ready for the refrigerator. I have to say the food processor part seemed unnecessary, but I did it anyway to ensure smooth frozen yogurt. I am not sure it really makes a difference, though.

Mixture goes into the machine bowl, mixing for 20-25 minutes.

Added the cherries in the last 5 minutes of mixing.

I don't have a picture of the finished product, but I am sure you can all picture it! Zach likes the frozen yogurt, and I don't. I think it is because of the maraschino cherry juice that I added, and it's just a bit too cherry for me. Next time, I just wouldn't add the cherry liquid. Even using fresh cherries may have been a bigger improvement, just because they are in season. Ah, I will have to make this again with those changes!

Look forward to more blog posts coming up soon!