Grill Night!

My kitchen is currently in shambles due to the fact that I had a grand idea to make some "interior design changes." If you own a house (or apartment), check out Young House Love and Apartment Therapy. My new favorite sites. Thanks, Janel. And if you ask nicely, maybe I'll even show you photos of the finished product.

So, this called for taking out the grill to do some cooking and throw together a simple salad. The results:

Grilled portabella caps with grilled white mushrooms and onions

My secret to grilling mushrooms is to give them a good soaking in a good balsamic vinegar.

Grilled corn, fresh from my CSA. The key here is to shuck the outermost layer of each ear, so it doesn't catch on fire. Grill on each side for 5-7 minutes, cool, peel, and enjoy.

Vegetable and bean salad.

While I'd love to actually give you the recipe to these things, it's really about technique and the skill of knowing what goes together. In this case, I chopped my fresh veggies (tomato, cucumber, corn, and onion) into small slices, added a splash of olive oil and balsamic vinegar, dumped in a can of rinsed kidney beans, and the grilled mushrooms and onions. Mix it all up nice and voila! you've got a delicious bean and corn salad to serve atop your portabella cap.

And why waste grill space? Halve some local peaches (I picked mine here; you should too) and grill each side for 5 minutes or so. These will seriously change your world. For 70 calories for two halves, I'd eat this syrupy-sweet dessert every night if the peaches were always this fresh. Did I lick the peach juice from my plate? You bet.

Wouldn't you?

Question of the Day: Do you ever PYO (pick your own)? [No, not your nose.] This past Sunday I picked these peaches and some gigantic, fleshy blueberries. Probably one of my favorite summer activities that I look forward to every year!

Welcome to Martha's Vineyard + Best Lobster on the Cape Award

A well-kept secret that I'm going to share with all y'all blog readers is that there is a ferry in Falmouth harbor that will take you to Oak Bluffs in 35 minutes. Parking is cheap, and it's never filled! Next time you're going to MV, take the Island Queen!

(This is not my boat.)

Onto our day trip.

I used Chowhound to find another excellent brunch spot in Vineyard Haven. But before that, we had to rent a bike and head 3. 5 miles to the west!

We arrived mildly sweaty at the Art Cliff Diner. Usually this place has a huge wait, but it wasn't too bad (30 minutes-ish?) You'll see soon it was well worth it.

Brunch began with some delicious coffee. I peeked behind the counter and realized it's a special "The Art Cliff" Dean's Beans blend! Fill 'er up, please!

Local blueberry and honey crepe.

The whole enchilada.

And a side of eggy protein.

After our bellies were sufficiently full, we explored downtown Vineyard Haven. Getting right back on the bikes probably would have popped the tires.

Once we deemed it safe to get back to biking, we headed south to Edgartown.

Along the way, we stumbled upon MORNING GLORY FARM! They were gracious enough to send me a cookbook last fall, and I made some glorious recipes from it here. I highly recommend you check it out next time you're on the Vineyard, and get the cookbook. It has some practical, delicious recipes featuring seasonal foods and I use it often.

Fourteen or so miles later, we ended up on South Beach and went for a dip. South Beach has some great waves, minimal seaweed, and is at the end of the bike path to Katama!

After a swim and a 13 or so mile ride back, we were in dire need of one of these:

Best sugary lemonade drink you'll ever have after 25 miles on a rental bike. Best $3.00 spent all day.

And now, for the moment you've all been waiting for: my recommendation for the best lobster sandwich on the Cape.

Quicks Hole is a hole-in-the-wall cantina-like bar/pub/grill/grocery with the most excellent lobster tacos. While maybe they don't qualify in the "Best Lobster Roll" category, these lobster tacos were delicious and made without gobs of mayonnaise and with cilantro and avocado instead. Like I said before, I'm not a huge lobster fan, but I'd go back again and again to Quicks Hole for this delectable dish.

Who can eat lobster tacos without sangria?

Quicks Hole was featured in Edible Cape Cod, and I'm glad I got to try it out. What also impressed me was that they had a whole refrigerated section of local produce that you could purchase. From local cheeses to produce to milk, this Quicks 2 Go section was like a farmers' market in a fridge.

If you're ever on the Upper Cape in the Woods Hole area, check this little gem out!

Question of the Day: Where do you get your dining recommendations when traveling? Chowhound? Others' blogs? Tradition? Elsewhere?

The Falmouth Farmers' Market

Falmouth Farmers' Market is an excellent Cape market, and a great example of Massachusetts agriculture. Want to know where your closest farmers' market is in Massachusetts? Check out the 2010 guide here for dates, times, and locations.

One of my favorite discoveries at this market was the Edible Cape Cod magazine. I thought there was only an Edible Boston in MA. How wrong I was! Edible is an excellent publication that features local foods in the regional issues that are published. Does your state/city publish a version of Edible? Check here. This particular issue focused on some local fisherman, and made one fabulous recommendation for seafood tacos. You can read the articles in the latest issue here! "The Art of the Weir" and "Tub Trawling" were very well-written and insightful. It definitely gave me a much greater appreciation and understanding for the commercial fishing that occurs off the Cape coast.

We moseyed on home and whipped up a light dinner of cucumber, basil and tomato salad with olive oil drizzle and some guacamole with flaxseed chips.

(Guacamole is not a very photogenic food.)

We were all full from a late afternoon lunch, so a light dinner was perfect; we were also a little drowsy from 2 1/2 hours of kayaking through Monk's Cove in Bourne. By the way, my mom is pretty awesome. It was her birthday that day, and she chose to do something outdoorsy and active to celebrate her birthday! Happy birthday mom!

Tobey Island

An osprey!

See you in Martha's Vineyard!

Question of the Day: Have you ever been kayaking? What's your favorite water sport?