Farmers Market Bounty & Grilled Vegetables!

Of late I've been feeling a real need for healthy and veggie, sorry my fried zucchini and mushrooms, bye bye! Instead I have been grilling and broiling and eating vegetables in all of their bounty, yea springtime (or truthfully, nearly summertime)! Earlier this week I stopped at the store and picked up some delicious eggplant and portabella mushrooms to complement the zucchini that were already at home, envisioning the grill and all of these beautiful vegetables I pulled together a tasty summer grilled veggie salad complimented with crusted goat cheese rounds.

Grilled Vegetable Salad
1 Medium Eggplant, thinly sliced
4 Medium Zucchini, sliced length-wise
1 Small Jar Sun-Dried Tomatoes, packed in Olive Oil
2 Large Portabella Mushrooms
3 Large Hearts of Romaine Lettuce, chopped
Montreal Steak Seasoning (or a mixture of coarse ground salt, coarse ground black pepper, garlic powder and onion powder)
Olive Oil

Goat Cheese, Semi-soft
Bread Crumbs

3 Tbsp Stone Ground Dijon Mustard
3 Tbsp White Wine Vinegar
3 Tbsp Grapeseed Oil


1. Slice zucchini and eggplant, place in a large baking dish, marinate by drizzling with olive oil and adding seasoning. Marinate mushrooms as well, but do not slice ahead of cooking. Allow to sit for up to thirty minutes.
2. Either grill or broil veggies until tender and showing char marks.
3. In a skillet, heat sun-dried tomatoes until warmed.
4. Slice mushrooms and tomatoes length-wise.
5. Place mushrooms, tomatoes, zucchini and eggplant on a bed of Romaine, garnish with dressing and goat cheese rounds.
6. To make dressing, combine equal parts dijon mustard, white wine vinegar and grapeseed oil.
7. To make goat cheese rounds slice goat cheese generously, roll in bread crumbs and place alongside salad.




After this tasty dinner earlier this week my mom and I got up early today and hit two local farmers markets (that's right, two!). We had a great time staking things out, looking for beautiful produce and talking to the vendors. Living on the outer edge of Austin (really in Round Rock), we're close to some farming land, not like the old days but people with acreage and we are near enough to some of the rural parts of Central Texas that you get ranchers selling meats as well as the great produce and plants. We came back from our excursion with quite the haul! Loads of fresh fruit and veggies, fresh baked whole-wheat bread, a few basil plants for mom and a succulent for me (I really love cacti and succulent, they are a plant I can't kill!). We also requested a bone-in leg of lamb that we'll get next Saturday morning and grill next weekend, I'd say a pretty successful expedition all-in all. Can't wait to see what we find next weekend!