ripe tomatoes

 The water was cold (22C) but I forced myself into the icy waters as it would surely be the last swim of 2021 - September 1st, neither the earliest nor the latest swimmable water. The forecast is grim with days in the low 20s and nights in the low teens - not a drop of heat for the pool. I made sure to enjoy every moment.

Itˋs a big change from the 30+ days of last week!

Weˋve had a busy week of visiting. We dined alfresco with friends several nights in the last week: first Jo Ellen and Don, then Pat Tuesday night, and finally Trudie and Leo on Wednesday. Weˋve taken advantage of the cooler days and been able to keep the visits outside. It was almost like pre-covid days!

Yesterday I forced myself back into the kitchen to do something with some of the tomatoes streaming in from our garden. Itˋs amazing how many tomatoes 6 plants can make! Our oven is totally trashed with splattered oil… but yay, weˋll be able to test the self-clean option once the garden is bare.

The last of the zucchini was grated; some was formed into zucchini fritters while the rest was bagged for the freezer. Apparently the frozen zucc can be used in fritters so Iˋve added them to our menu planner.

The oven was on again this morning: another picking of tomatoes from the garden was transformed to a pinkish red roasted tomato soup. Then I whipped up a batch of banana spice muffins. And during all this I juggled 30 slices of bacon into and out of the microwave! Later a batch of Graceˋs grain mash cooked in the instant pot. Whew!

With all that prep we kept it simple for supper and had totally luscious toasted bacon and tomato sandwiches, heavy on the mayo with lots of fresh basil. Oh yeah baby!

Ontario is finally coming out with a vaccine passport. Maybe weˋll avoid a 4th wave but I have a feeling there will be a lockdown early in the winter.

Awesome!

“the heaviness of a ripe tomato”

“3 packages of grated zucchini stored in the freezer - fritters in the winter”

“friends around the table”

“sitting down for a minute after a day in the kitchen”

“2 more containers of roasted tomatoes plus a gallon of soup!”

“thick mayo mixed with tomato juices dripping out of my sandwich”