Penne with Sweet Summer Vegetables, and Herbs

I had this recipe saved from 2012. I feel bad that I waited this long to make it. What a fantastic summer dish. All the vegetables were purchased at Coles Farm Stand. Roasting them they had even more flavor. They were tender and caramelized. The recipe originally appeared on the Food52 site. I did make a couple of little changes. Here is the link to the original recipe. What I did differently, to begin with, was  to cut the recipe in half. For the ingredients, I did not have a full pint of cherry tomatoes so I used a nice big ripe tomato. I did not use the garlic and I was out of pine nuts. And the best part was that Chris loved this dinner.  (Shhhh, this was a meatless meal!)

Summer Tart with Zucchini, Tomato, and Bacon

Did you know that if you put bacon in anything it just might taste better? I love making tarts. Yeah, it's all about the crust. Well, the funny thing about this one was the crust was not perfect. I do not know what was done incorrectly but it was not as easy to work with as it always is. I used my usual recipe, the only difference was I added fresh thyme to the dough. Perhaps it was the weather?

Anyway, a troublesome crust was not about to stop me from making this tart. I sauteed Zucchini, Yellow Squash and Patty Pan Squash in a little olive oil and seasoned it with salt and pepper. Also sauteed some shallots and onions.

I rolled out the crust into a kind of a rectangle. I brushed the crust with Dijon mustard. I had seen that done on a recipe somewhere online. It was the perfect addition. I put some sliced cheddar down on top of the mustard and then layered on the vegetables. Next I added sliced tomatoes. An heirloom tomato, a yellow tomato, and a variety of cherry tomatoes. I topped the tart with cooked bacon.

The tart went in a 375˚ oven for about 35 minutes, until the crust began to brown but not burn.
This was a perfect summer dinner along with a simple green salad.

Two Tomato Pasta with Mozzarella, Basil & Toasted Almonds

This recipe is a twist on a recipe that I saw online last week. The blog The Italian Dish has a lot of amazing recipes. This one was suppose to be Two Tomato Pasta with Mozzarella, Basil & Pine Nuts. Never mind that on the blog the dish is presented in a beautiful bowl, the pasta looked delicious.
My variation started with not roasting the tomatoes. I sauteed them in a little olive oil and salt to make a quick sauce. I also opted for the orrecchiete because, well I had it in the cabinet!
Oh there was one other change I made... the pine nuts. $9.00 for a small container of pine nuts! Seriously! No way was I going to make that purchase. So I went to Food52 and visited the FoodPickle and typed in substitution for pine nuts... toasted skinless almond, which I had in the cupboard!
We both enjoyed this. The tomatoes were so nice ripe and the basil was from my plant on the deck.