A Very Berry Dinner Indeed

Three quarts of strawberries and we have dinner. Well, sort of, there certainly were other foods involved. But you can't have a end of spring beginning of summer feast without a love of strawberries. Luckily, our guest agreed!

On the menu for last night we had:

A Chicken in a strawberry fig port sauce with sliced strawberries on top.

Roasted Japanese sweet potatoes, asparagus, beets, snow peas mixed with an arugula pesto.

And for dessert we had a no bake strawberry pie with fresh whipped cream.


The chicken dish I felt totally confident about. You can't go wrong with a wine sauce, especially when it has the fruit of Jesus in it FIGS!!!! OK OK so figs aren't local to Massachusetts, but I just couldn't resist. Figs are one of the oldest fruits that we know man has eaten, that makes it OK in my book. As guessed the chicken came out incredible tender and full of flavor. The recipe I based it on said to glaze the chicken in the sauce, hmmmm not in this house. I decided it was best to marinade and cook the chicken in it. I'm glad I love to improvise.


The roasted veggies on the other hand were stressing me out all day. Beets are something new to me. My only real experience with them is pickled in a can, yuck. Luckily, my lady loves beets and had some insight into how to cook them. At the dinner table I watched as all of us unfamiliar with this root vegetable slowly took our first bites. SUCCESS!!!! This dish is a keeper and will be great with a variety of different veggies or different kinds of pesto.

The Recipe

four to five cups of whatever veggies are in season. I used Japanese sweet potatoes, asparagus, snow peas and those yummy beets.

mix the potatoes or any root vegetable with olive oil and place on a roasting pan and cook at 425 degrees for 45 minutes.

mix the rest of the vegetables with olive oil and spices I used pepper and herbamare. more on why I love herbamare another time. Place the rest of the veggies in with the potatoes and cook for another 15-20 minutes.

While waiting take a few cloves of garlic and pulse it in a food processor or blender. Slowly add five cups of arugula, 1/2 cup of pine nuts and olive oil into the food processor. Pulse it until well mixed. I personally love garlic so I add more garlic, but that is just me.

After the veggies are cooked place them in a bowl and mix them generously with the pesto. It's as simple as that and you have a filling veggie packed side dish. It would be great to bring to pot lucks or dinner parties.

We ended the evening with the strawberry pie and everyone was happy. Except Mr. Pittman who's word were " Next time add some damn rhubarb." OK Adam, next time. Unfortunately, we will have to wait until next spring for more local rhubarb.