Zucchini Gratin

When it comes to food the power of suggestion beats me every time. More often then not a beautiful food photo is what first inspires me to try out a new recipe. Usually once I have seen a delicious looking picture I cannot get whatever it is out of my head and must taste it. Yes, I am a food advertisers dream. Recently I saw a picture of this Zucchini Gratin dish on another food blog (Bless Her Heart) and thought it looked delicious. I will admit that I really like roasted vegetables, especially when they are smothered in cheese. So when my mother in -law asked us to bring something as a side for dinner I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to test out the recipe. The basic recipe I used can be found at finecooking.com (follow this link). The only adjustment I made was that I really wanted a little bit of a creamy texture. So I made a garlic-lemon cream sauce to drizzle over the gratin last, just before I put it in the oven. I highly recommend trying this recipe out.

Additional Cream Sauce:
- One Tbsp butter melted in a small sauce pan
- One clove minced garlic, simmered in the butter
- 1 to 2 Tbsp cream added to the garlic
- Juice from one lemon

Our Garden - Part 1

One of my favorite parts of spring is planting our garden. In the past we have had only one bed and a couple of small containers, so we have been limited to growing just a few things. This year we really want to try to grow more of our own food, given the space that we have, and then try to supplement with the local farmer's markets. Hopefully in the long run this will save money (and we will not end up with $10 tomatoes), give us more say in the production of foods we consume, and reduce the amount of packaging we use in purchased foods. So we built 3 new raised beds in our yard and still have the old bed. We spent one day building and digging, and two days moving dirt. Today we finally put seeds into the ground. In the first bed we planted spinach, collards, lettuce, and cabbage. We will keep you all posted on our progress and the yummy things we cook over the summer with our veggies.

Bed 1:
- Spinach
- Collards
- Lettuce
- Cabbage

Bed 2:
-Kohlrabi
- Zucchini
- Squash
- Eggplant
- Jalapenos
- Banana Peppers

Bed 3:
- Bell Peppers (Yellow, Orange, Red, Green)
- Tomatoes