I can always count on the kitchens of Martha Stewart Living for simple yet delicious recipes that my whole family will love. So when it comes to meal planning tools, I knew I had to try "Grocery Bag" meal plans by Everyday Food.

In each month of Everyday Food and online at www.marthastewart.com, there is a feature called Grocery Bag. Grocery Bag is a set of five weeknight menus with a ready to print or tear grocery list. The Grocery Bag meal plan promises one trip to the grocery store at the start of the week resulting in a week's worth of dinners. I've seen meal plans like this before, but never have I followed one so faithfully as I done had last week. I decided I would follow the meal plan exactly as it appeared, using the shopping list and recipes to help me "sail through dinner from Monday all the way to Friday with our editors' time-tested strategies for ease." So was it smooth sailing?

Sesame Chicken Cucumber Noodle Salad

What do you bring to an end-of-summer potluck? On a man-made island, capped off by excavated dirt from the Big Dig? To celebrate your child's friend's half-birthday and his mom's (ahem) birthday? I wanted to bring something different befitting of the day's festivities. And it needed to be a crowd-pleaser. That's when I turn to Ming Tsai.

In one of my favorite cookbooks, Simply Ming One-Pot Meals, Ming starts of by saying, "Just about everyone loves sesame noodle salad, including me." I knew I had to give this a try. Click here for Ming's recipe in Eating Well.

 The Good: It was a big hit with everyone. And pretty easy to prepare. Ming was right - again.

The Bad: While this is not a complicated dish, it does take some time in terms of prep. Love that the dish is packed with veggies, but prepare to do a lot of chopping.

Grade: B+. Will definitely be making this again. Will experiment with ways to make this even lighter.

A couple of tips if you are preparing this for a crowd -

• I doubled the recipe and there was enough to feed a small army (8 adults, 8+ kids)
• There was way too much peanut dressing - but okay if you plan to set some aside for salad dressing later in the week
• Wait to dress the salad just before serving
• Splurge and use some good quality toasted sesame. I used Toasted Sesame Ginger Seasoning by Victoria Taylor's Seasonings.

View of Boston from ferry to Spectacle Island. Boston Harbor Islands is a must-see!

What is your signature dish for a potluck? What are some tips for keeping meals fresh while traveling?

We're two weeks into our Fall routine - dragging the boys out of bed, packing school lunches, shuttling kids, soccer practice, etc. Our days are pretty jammed and if I don't have a meal plan for the week, chances are we're having frozen pizza or take-out at least once for dinner. With two young kids, I don't have time to make last minute trips to the store. I'm a planner. I need recipes and shopping lists (and a glass of wine doesn't hurt) to get me through the week.

I've discovered there are a TON of websites and apps out there offering to help make meal planning simpler. So I thought I would test-drive some meal planning sites and apps over the next few weeks and share my thoughts on what worked and what didn't.





Planning Tool Review #1: Real Simple's Weekday Meal Plan and Shopping List

What is it: download and printable list to organize dinners and shopping list

How it works:

1. Decide on your weekday dinners and write them in the menu column on the left. I find menu ideas online, cookbooks and magazines. Real Simple suggests planning dishes that rely on perishable groceries (fish, chicken, fresh basil) at the start of the week and sturdier foods (pasta, eggs, frozen shrimp) at the end. I'll be blogging about some of my favorite sources for menu inspiration.
2. Write down the ingredients you’ll need to buy for each dinner in the appropriate columns to the right. Use the miscellaneous section for other purchases, like lunch supplies and paper towels.
3. Grab your list and head to the store. 
4. If you're like me and can't remember what you actually planned, hang on to your list throughout the week.

The Skinny: It doesn't get more straightforward than this. This has become my go-to tool for planning and organizing meals for the week. I only wish it was an editable PDF.

Click here to download.

This is it. The last days of summer. I knew this day would come. But I think I was pretty successful in living in denial last week while on vacation. A week on the Cape with abundant sunshine certainly helps. We also made sure our meals featured seasonal produce - corn on the cob, grilled zucchini and caprese salads just to name a few.

When I came across a recipe for Peach Plum Salsa, I was excited to test this summer fruit salsa out on my favorite beach bums.


Peach Plum Salsa
Adapted from Cook's Country Backyard Barbecue

INGREDIENTS

• 1/2 jalapeno chile, seeded & minced
• 1 shallot, minced
• 2 teaspoons cider vinegar
• 2 teaspoons honey
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 ripe peaches, pitted and chopped fine
• 2 ripe plums, pitted and chopped fine
• 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh basil
• kosher salt

DIRECTIONS

1. Whisk jalapeno, shallot, vinegar, honey, and oil in a small bowl. Let sit for 15 minutes for flavors to combine.
2. Combine peaches and plums in a large bowl. Add 1/2 cupe of fruit to bowl with jalapeno mixture and mash with potoato masher until smooth.
3. Add mashed fruit mixture and basil to bowl with cut fruit and stir until combined. 
4. Season with salt and let sit until flavors combine (15 minutes).
5. Serve with grilled meat or fish or with favorite corn chips.

The Good: Easy to whip up. The boys loved, loved it. Even got them to eat their pork chops!

The Bad: Fruit will become mushy after half a day. Wasn't a problem though since the fam devoured it.

Grade: A. Solid.

Dining out with kids is always an experiment. So we thought it was appropriate to take our pickiest eater to Clover Food Lab.

Clover Food Lab is Food-Truck-Turned-Restaurant located in Harvard Square. Labeled "food lab" for its constantly evolving menu, Clover is known for its fresh, high-quality, vegetarian breakfast and lunch options. I had been hearing about their “amazing veggie sandwiches” for some time. I was excited to check it out and hopefully get some veggies in my two year old with the "white-carbs-only" diet. So we headed over to 7 Holyoke Street on a Wednesday just before noon.

Entrance to the "food lab"

In true Harvard/MIT fashion, you are greeted at the door by "new-school-meets-old-school" -- Clover staff equipped with an iPod Touch, takes your order, emails it to the kitchen, and makes change using a good old apron/change counter.

Order-taker taking orders via iPod Touch and credit card machines tucked behind sandwich boards

The menu changes daily, which is smartly captured with these electronic sandwich boards. Besides just looking cool, want to know what the best thing is about these sandwich boards? The wait-time for each item is listed next to the menu item and gets updated in real-time based on how busy the kitchen becomes. How long will it take to get the BBQ seitan sandwich? 2.8 minutes. When you have hungry kids pulling on your clothes asking when the food will be ready, this is huge.

Electronic sandwich board with up-to-the-minute menu items

Open kitchen kinda looks like a lab

Coffee by Melittas

No plates, just paper.

From one of my all-time favorite The Simpsons episodes. "Lisa the Vegetarian" is about Lisa becoming a vegetarian after bonding with a lamb at a petting zoo. However, she gets ridiculed by her schoolmates and family (of course) for her beliefs. But after meeting Paul and Linda McCartney via a secret passage to the roof of Apu's Kwik-E Mart, she vows to vegetarianism. I'm smiling just thinking about how absurd this storyline is. But it is oh so funny.

[Homer fills the grill with lighter fluid and prepares to grill]
Lisa: Wait Dad! Good news, everyone! You don't have to eat meat! I've got enough gazpacho for everyone.
[Crowd murmurs]
Lisa: It's tomato soup, served ice cold!
[Crowd laughs out loud as Lisa growls and stomps off]
Barney Gumble: Go back to Russia!

If Lisa can enjoy gazpacho, my boys surely can, right? It was worth a try. It's been too damn hot to cook, and great way to get some veggies in.

Shrimp Gazpacho
Adapted from Everyday Food: Great Food Fast from The Kitchens of Martha Stewart Living

INGREDIENTS:


The Good: Quick and easy to prepare. The boys loved the shrimp.

The Bad: Shrimp with gazpacho flavor combo had me thinking I was eating shrimp cocktail. Not necessarily a bad thing I guess!

Grade: B+. Totally refreshing, clean dish for the summer. The boys tolerated the shrimp but wanted nothing to do with ice cold tomato soup.

My family and I had the good fortunate to have spent a long weekend on Martha's Vineyard recently. I've had the opportunity to visit several times before and was looking forward to introducing the boys to "The Vineyard" as it often called. Of course they got to experience some homemade island ice cream, The Flying Horses, the Gingerbread Houses, the sun, sand and surf of course. What we didn't expect was the amazing produce and creative food from a surprisingly large number of local producers for such a small island. It was like a mini photography retreat for me - the photo opps were too numerous to count.

So here is just a small selection of some of my favorite pics from a food blogger's perspective. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves!

Morning Glory Farm Strawberry Festival - live music, games, activities and great food.

Strawberry cupcakes

Strawberry lemonade and Spinach Salad with Strawberries, Walnuts and Parmesan

Strawberry Salsa and Chilled Cucumber Soup

Farm hands working the grill

Festival Menu (one of each please!). Everything was outstanding.

West Tisbury Farmers Market was THE place to be Saturday morning

Garlic scape aplenty

This season's favorite ice cream parlor based on the crowds

What are some of your favorite farmers markets? How do you like to spend your summer vacation?