Hello, tender friends!
In the words of Nelly, “It’s gettin’ hot in here.” The summer heat has arrived in Southwest Virginia. But we’re continuing to crank the heat up even higher…by eating hot peppers. I’ve been looking forward to that slightly painful beginning of season burn on the tongue, and it hasn’t disappointed!
We have made quite a few new combinations so far this season, but I’m only going to focus on the most simple today. It’s paleo and keto and is a nutritional powerhouse. I just learned that summer squash is a staple crop in many blue zones, so I hope you’re able to eat some this season. (Blue zones are areas where people typically live much longer than the average).
How did this never occur to us before? SUMMER SQUASH + HOT PEPPERS
If you read nothing else, lock that combination in your heart and stomach. It’s so easy, and we can harvest all the produce from our own garden (we also grow onions), which always has its own special thrill for us.
When you’re cooking squash every day in new ways and this is still on your counter, you want to use these babies up, and this is an efficient way to do it.
This is how it works:
I recommend starting out by cutting up your summer squash into quartered slices, placing in a strainer with a bowl underneath, and salting the squash and letting it sit for an hour. If you typically find squash too watery, this will drain a lot of the water out and result in a more concentrated flavor. If you can’t include this step, don’t worry, as the recipe still works. But including this step is best practice when possible.
You will need:
Summer squash- We have made it with multiple kinds, but our favorite is the yellow crookneck. We didn’t even really love the crookneck last year, but this recipe has given us a new appreciation for it! We have also mixed in multiple varieties of green squash as necessary.
Jalapeno and poblano peppers (We also threw in a purple Cayenne, and this is my favorite plant of the season in terms of aesthetics. Doesn’t that vivid purple just steal your breath?) Truly, any hot pepper will do, but this is just what we had available right now.
Bell peppers
Onion
Olive oil (or avocado oil, but we didn’t have any)
Baking dish
Parchment paper
Directions:
Line your baking dish with parchment paper. You want the parchment paper to absorb the moisture cooking out of the veggies and also keep the oil sliding around, so including the parchment paper is necessary. Then load the squash with minced onion, minced bell peppers and minced hot peppers. Add a splash of oil (probably a half teaspoon, but I don’t usually measure). Add salt to taste. Bake at 375 degrees for about twenty minutes. When you pull it out of the oven, place everything in a dish with a slotted spoon to drain as much water out as possible. Top with nutritional yeast. If you’re not doing this as a paleo recipe, a tiny pad of butter puts the dish over the top, but it’s good even without it.
In addition to the obvious benefits of eating summer squash and onions, hot peppers contain capsaicin, which are pathogen-slaying and cancer-killing soldiers when you consume them. God’s garden pharmacy is so full of cost-effective healing.
So “Mix a little bit of ah, ah
With a little bit of ah, ah” and enjoy the health benefits! (I know that’s not what Nelly meant, but I’ve taken some artistic license there).
Let me know what’s popping in your garden, please!
Oh, and here’s a pic of Cub and me after eating this dish on the Fourth of July. Getting a picture with my little buddy is typically always rushed, and I clearly have some weird hair going on from the rain that fell, but look at his little face of joy as he eats his almond flour “cupcake.”
That’s it for today, tender friends. Thank you so much for stopping by. We’re headed to the local fair this weekend, and I’ll be sharing a post on Monday about the word I received from the Lord at last year’s fair. I’m off to make some zucchini soup with my bone broth/egg shell base and will share about that soon if it turns out well.
Thank you for sharing!
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