Key Lime Pie Bars

Hola, mis compadres! It's been a loooooooooooong time, I know. Let's just put the hiatus behind us and never speak of it again. Instead, let's talk about delicious things, like key lime pie bars :) Yummmm.

Awhile ago I was at the grocery story and needed one lime, but all they had were bags of limes. So I thought to myself, when life gives you limes, make dessert.  I also happened to have graham crackers and some cream cheese, and thus was born the idea of a key lime style cheesecake bar. 

Key lime pie is a ridiculously simple dessert that is basically sweetened condensed milk, lime juice, and a binder.  I usually add sour cream to my key lime pies, but because I was making bars instead of a pie, I used cream cheese instead to add a slightly fluffier, more cheesecake-like texture.

Deconstructed Shish Kebabs

Hot town, summer in the city. Or more accurately, summer in the outskirts of a small industrialized town.

One of the best things about summer cooking is the opportunity to grill everything.  I, unfortunately, don't have a grill.  At some point in my life, I'd like to become a real grill master. For now, though, I try to find creative ways around making things sans grill.  This usually isn't too difficult if you are comfortable with your broiler.

This whole "deconstructed shish kebab" fiasco started when I picked up some sirloin tips for a great price at Wegmans.  It being summer, though, I didn't want to make a stew, so I thought-- aha! Shish kebabs! My plan was all set and I was ready to start cooking when I realized I forgot to get one very important thing at the store...skewers. I had reached the point of no return with my preparations, so I did what any good cook (but not great because a great cook would have remembered skewers and probably been doing this on a grill to start) would do and threw everything on a sheet tray under the broiler.

Was the method fancy? No. Did it require any cooking skills whatsoever? Not really. But was the end result delicious? You can bet your sweet patootie it was.

Peach and Raspberry Pie

One of the great paradoxes of life is the desire to make fresh fruit pies in the middle of summer.  Berries and stone fruit are in season, so summer is the perfect time to make a pie. But the oppressive heat makes you want to do anything BUT turn on your oven. When faced with the choice of to pie or not to pie, I always choose pie. If only Hamlet had had this kind of clarity.

I'm not actually a huge peach pie fan. When a pie is made with just peaches, I find the flavor to be one-dimensional and sometimes cloyingly sweet. At the other end of the spectrum, raspberries pies are notoriously tart, even for a raspberry fiend like myself.  But when you marry the two together, ahhhhhh.....perfect harmony. The raspberries add some tartness and variety to the pie, and the peaches, when balanced with something else, seem delightfully sweet and summery.

Pies fillings are very straightforward things to make, so to challenge myself, I decided to make my crust from scratch. 

Simple Summer Mojitos

It. Is. Hot.

It is flipping hot, actually. And humid. Thank heavens for air conditioning! I honestly think if I had to live somewhere as muggy as Western PA in July without AC, I would lose my will to live. Call me dramatic if you must, but the humidity right now is seriously out of control.

I'm always astounded that air conditioning wasn't invented until the 20th century, and even after that wasn't widely used until the middle of the century. If I had been around when the distribution of electricity was implemented, the FIRST THING I would have done would have been to invent residential air conditioning... Given I was at least an engineer and probably also a genius.

Fun fact: great strides were made in the technology behind air conditioning during the construction of the Panama Canal. Workers were contracting malaria from mosquitos, but they thought it was from the heat, so they developed AC as a preventative measure. Obviously it didn't work, which was bad news for the guys with malaria, but great in the long run for us today.

I think the best relief during these hot, humid day is a nice, cold beverage.  Preferably made with rum. I made these simple mojitos for my family and they were a smashing success.