Spinach, Beet and Goat Cheese Salad

Beets are a new love of mine. When I was little, I found them overwhelmingly “earthy”, a.k.a. I thought they tasted like dirt. As I’ve grown a tad older, I find that their sweetness stands out more and more. I’ve been seeing a lot of beet salads on menus lately, so I wanted to try my own take on the concept – and take advantage of my new love of this sweet veg!

Mushroom Phyllo Rolls

Sometimes I feel left out. It seems I’m the only person on earth who doesn’t like mushrooms. I can handle them if they’re finely chopped and spread throughout a dish, so really it’s mostly a texture thing – I actually like the flavour! So I tried to invent an appetizer for my friends’ get together that balanced their love for mushrooms and my intense dislike of the texture. I settled on making a hybrid – the filling taken from my boyfriend’s aunt’s pinwheels, and my own phyllo wrapping that would add a crunch to the mushroom mix. Here’s what I came up with:

Simple Tomato Salad

I’ve been trying to soak up the last little bits of summer, so I’ve been seeking out some of that classic summer produce. I managed to pick up the cutest selection of baby tomatoes – not really cherry, or grape… a whole mix of shapes and sizes. So I did what I do with the season’s best tomatoes – I eat them raw in a simple tomato salad. This is a basic recipe that is so versatile – as a side to a meat dish, tossed into hot pasta, tucked into a sandwich, or just by itself.