My grandmother used to have a house dress, house hair, and house shoes.  She made no apologies for boiling her fresh vegetables half way to kingdom come.  She sat with her Bible at every spare moment.

I… well, I have a house sweater.  It’s big and grey with floppy sleeves and giant buttons.  It’s just a house sweater, unless of course I decide that it can handle a quick trip to the store or a quick meet with a friend.  It really should stay in the house, as beat up and unattractive as it is… but sometimes it’s just too warm and cozy to part with.  I don’t even want to talk about introducing the house sweater to someone that you’re dating.  That’s a whole other beast to tackle.

My grandmother would support my house sweater.  She’d nod in quiet understanding.  She’d also love that I have her Bible on my nightstand, and I read and reread all the bits she underlined in red pen.  This salad?  She would not understand.  It’s entirely too fresh and crisp and… unboiled.  I suppose that’s the difference between her Tennessee blood and my California living.

Blood oranges are here and I couldn’t be happier.  Every orange is different.  The red tinting can be subtle or totally bonkers.  Beauty fruit.  I’m so into it!

I combined sweet blood oranges with creamy avocado, salty feta cheese, and crunchy sunflower seeds.

Spinach too.  Fully of flavor and health.  On the real.

This is the sort of salad that you can eat and feel like you’re indulging in a good life.  Not like you’re on a diet.  Not like you’re depriving yourself of peanut butter cups.  This salad is a treat in itself… and totally justify peanut butter cups for dessert.

This salad was inspired by a really lovely book.  Tender by Nigel Slater.  It’s like an encyclopedia for vegetables with gorgeous, simple, indulgent recipes for each vegetable.  I love the photographs and recipe lay outs.  Very laid back and personal, but beautifully intentional.  The man knows has a gorgeous respect for food.

Thanks sister!  Major gift!

This recipe is in paragraph form… that means take it easy and enjoy the process.  Just go with it.  Don’t have feta cheese?  Try goat cheese crumbles.  No sunflower seeds?  Toasted walnuts would be lovely.  No blood oranges?  Grapefruit is the way to go!

The Simple Lunch is for days when:

maybe you’re nervous and possibly overwhelmed.

you’ve considered dipping your morning muffin in good olive oil.

you want to remember the days when you highlighted your hair with lemon juice and sunlight.

you need to sprinkle salt on your lunch aaaannnddd over your shoulder.

you want day wine… maybe two glasses.  no judgements.

Take a moment to enjoy The Simple Lunch…

it’s just like taking a warm morning walk.

it’s just like relaxing on your couch and just zoning out staring at your wall paper.

The Simple Lunch is happy and relaxed.

Grab a baguette, a ripe avocado, lemon, sea salt, fresh ground pepper, and a sprinkling of olive oil.  Aaand go!

Real talk:  I bring you this abbreviated post because I’m bonkers busy right now.  But but but!  BUT!  Avocado toast is majorly delicious and and AND, I’m trying to figure out a way to put baked cheese things on a stick.  I’ll bring you those treats (fingers crossed) this weekend!  I love you… let’s hug.

You know what’s not a good idea?  Shopping for jeans after an ‘eat weekend’.

Don’t act like you don’t know what an ‘eat weekend’ is.  Don’t act like you haven’t ever eaten nothing but spaghetti and meat balls, doughnuts, onion rings, and mango margaritas for an entire weekend.   Surely I’m not the only one.

Maybe I am the only dummy who would go shopping for jeans after such a gluttonous two days.

Can I tell you the worst part?  The sales dude.  Yea… DUDE.  He insisted on seeing every pair of jeans I tried on.  Um… no way, dude.  No way.

Can I tell you the second worst part?  I had to have the sales dude go back to the floor to get me a larger size in all the jeans I had selected.  Larger.  Yea…  that wasn’t embarrassing at all.

So I made a salad.

Whatever.  This has nothing to do with the jeans incident or ‘eat weekend’… maybe I just like salad more than I like onion rings.

I love to pair radishes with green onions.  Mostly I just love the way they look together.

This edamame salad also has chopped parsley, ripe avocado, a garlic and ginger dressing, and sesame seeds.

This salad is so fresh (as in cool, duh), and so simple.  I thawed and blanched a bag of shelled edamade beans.  Even cooked, soybeans have a bit of crunch.  Combine that crunch with spicy radishes and creamy avocado.  Come on… you know this is the business.

The dressing is a touch spicy.  Thank you garlic.  Thank you ginger.

Look how healthy and wholesome this is.

What ‘eat weekend’!?   That couldn’t have been me.

I know what you’re craving.  I know what you’ve got on your mind.  I know juuuuust the thing you need.

Cold.  Green.  Soup.

Sexy right?  Just the thing you’ve been yearning for?  The answer to all of your burning questions?  The great treasure?

Wait…. no!?

Cold green soup isn’t your thing?  Come on…. let me at least try to change your mind.

This soup starts with creamy, ripe, delicious avocados.  We’re off to a wonderful start!  It’s the start of amazing things like guacamole.  But wait… stop thinking about guacamole.  We’re not making that.

Psssst!  Sneak up top and check out the podcast page for the latest Joy the Baker Podcast!

Look how pretty food is!

This is going into the creamy, cold, green goodness.

Sweet corn is worth freaking out over.

Sweet corn with lime and cooked onions is worth triple freaking out over.

We’re going to cook up all of these pretties and spoon a generous portion into the center of the creamy, cold, green goodness soup.

These corn, spice, and bacon mixture will add just the kick and crunch the soup needs.  Lime?  Zesty.  Parsley?  Bright.

The recipe is adapted from this month’s Bon Appetit magazine.

They also have a clever corn-cutting trick.  I didn’t use their clever corn-cutting trick.  I prefer to have my corn fly all over my counter and floor as I cut it.

Also… please look at the cover on Bon Appetit.  It’s pietown central in this month’s issue.

How is it that I decided to make cold, green soup?  I dunno.  I don’t.  I have issues.

The soup is as smooth as can be.  Avocado blends beautifully and creates a pure velvet soup.  It’s flavored delicately with only lime and salt, so the avocado flavor really shines through.  A generous amount of sweet corn and salty bacon  hash give each bite of this soup a kick of flavor and a touch of crunch.  The soup and hash are a match made in heaven.

Creamy, bright, salty, rich and delicious.  I wasn’t sure I would love this soup… I’ll be honest… then I finished two bowls.  It’s different, and sometimes different is delicious!

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve had for dinner?

Tonight I had:

Mung beans tossed in butter, salt, and pepper.  Mung beans.  Yea… not ideal.

Frozen corn, made unfrozen in boiling water… tossed with butter, salt, and pepper.

A flour tortilla… while standing over my desk, looking glossy-eyed at my massive to-do list.

A sprig of parsley.  I dunno.  Because it was green and there on the counter.

Water from my water bottle… followed by a hearty slug of bourbon, poured over tiny ice cubes.

… I’m also really bad at re-filling the ice tray.  Future husband, I’m sorry.  I love you.  I hope you hate ice.

And, for dessert, a frozen chocolate cupcake.  I’m about 7 seconds away from going to grab another cupcake from the freezer.  Believe that.

This is what I eat when left to my own devices.  Clearly, I should not be left alone.  I’m not sure how much longer I can survive like this… I’m a complete weirdo.  Someone hold my hand and make me cook you dinner… that’s the only way I eat like a regular person.

These avocados?  See how nicely sliced they are?  This is the sign that I’m cooking for others, and not just standing in my kitchen eating tortillas.

I like fruit in my salad.  I especially like citrus.  I super especially like citrus if it’s sliced all fancylike.

Segmented.  Totally classy, right?

Oranges are easy to segment.  Once the peel is stripped, you just have to slice in between the natural orange segment markers/ skin bits/ pith marks… what the word I’m looking for?

I made dressing too!

The dressing is inspired by my favorite mason jar/ good olive oil/ fresh cracked pepper/ and Tracy’s mom.

Salad dressing.  Shaken.  It’s cathartic.   Cats pay no attention.

But wait!  Are my hands starting to look suspiciously 30 years old?  Don’t answer that.  (Yea… they kinda are) ((Don’t agree with that… thanks)).

This salad is simple, bright, and completely adaptable.  Try grapefruit instead of orange segments.  Peaches?  Yes.  Strawberries?  Ok!

Arugula instead of Romaine?  Do that?  Did you say spinach?  I like the way you think.

It’s salad.  No biggie.  Make it your own… then serve it to others.

I’d also like to distract you with the crazy delicious bread I made to go along with this salad.  It has strawberries on it, and I can’t wait to tell you about it on Wednesday.

Look at this spread!  Wine and bourbon and bread and such.

If feeling:

lonely, bored, restless, hungry, smell deprived, sleep deprived, cold, greedy, kooky, crazy, cabin fevery, sun deprived, snow deprived, sullen, extraordinary, sluggish or spicy…

Might I suggest turning up the oven and roasting a bulb of garlic?

Hello, garlic.

I’m gonna chop your head off and put oil in your brains.

Salt and pepper.  Salt and pepper.  Salt and pepper.  Salt and pepper and paper.

Wrap it up.  Tie it up.

I used parchment paper and a kitchen string.  If you want to use foil… you totally should.  I was out.  I got creative.

When roasted, garlic turn into something sweet, aromatic, creamy, spreadable and utterly dream worthy.  Your breath will still me an absolute nightmare… but  just deal with it.

I hid my freshly roasted garlic in between butter and mashed avocado on this (burnt) toast.  I didn’t need the butter or the avocado… but I like layers of delicious.  I also like burnt toast.

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I’d really like to conjure up some useful information for you.  That would be nice, right?  I could tell you all about avocados.  Where they came from.  What a lovely shade of green they are.  Why they’re so expensive at the grocery store… you know, things like that.

But you didn’t come here for boring old information… did you!?

I didn’t think so.

You came here  because you want me to admit to eating Pepperidge Farm Soft Bake Cookies…which is totally happening right now.  You came here because you want me to admit to rrreeeeaaaalllllyyyy wanting to watch the season finale of The Bachelor… it’s true… it’s a problem.  You came here because you want me to admit to wearing my big fluffy slipper socks.  The dreaded socks/shoes that will keep me single for eternity.  Well… I’m wearing them and I’m loving it.

So there, friends.  It’s all out on the table.  Now can we talk about cake?

I’ve baked with avocado before.  Remember the Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cake with Avocado Buttercream? Yea… that was intense… and surprising… and bright green.  Amazing.

I got my hands on another round of avocados and made some magic happen.  This recipe makes two glorious loaves of cake.  I’ve cut back on the butter and thrown in some ripe mashed avocados.  The batter is moistened with buttermilk and bakes up with a lovely golden top and faintly green center.

Can you taste the avocado after the cake is baked?  Heck yes you can!  It’s subtle but distinct with a nice sweetness and a hint of crunch from cornmeal.  I love this pound cake.  It’s a home run.

We served this pound cake for The Violet Hour supper brunch with  blood orange, pink grapefruit and pomelo segments and a lightly sweetened rose whipped cream.  Whoa!  Whole lotta yum.

Ok… first of all, stop looking at me like that.

Yea, I can see that crazy look on your face.  But it’s me.  The same person that brought you amazing Cream Cheese Cinnamon Rolls and Perfect Lemon Pound Cake. We trust each other.  We have an understanding.  Just go with me on this.

Something about hot summer weather gets me to thinking (or melts my brain) and brings some strange recipes to the surface.  Remember last year’s Blueberry Ice Cream with Homemade Hot Fudge?  Yea… I got a few strange looks for that too.

Because I still see those raised eyebrows on your face, let me tell you a little about this beast of a cake.  Believe me, I was super skeptical too.

The vegan chocolate cake is dense and moist, and everything you might want from a chocolate cake minus the eggs and butter.  The fat in the cake is almond oil (or anything you have on hand) and one whole mashed avocado.  It’s lovely, and I didn’t taste a lick of avocado in the cake.

The avocado buttercream is a dash more strange.  Yes, it’s bright green.  Yes, the only fat in the buttercream is avocado meat.  It’s sweet with slight hints of citrus.  I had my doubts, but when combined with the chocolate cake… holy wow!  It actually worked!  It was honest-to-goodness delicious!  Not to mention vegan and full of healthy fats!

Your thoughts?  Have I scared you off?