NJ SPICE

I already wrote about the lovely Grand Aioli dinner I enjoyed in early June, but here’s the rest of a month full of good food, in spite of the three weeks of it I spent taking antibiotics to stave off Lyme disease. Besides sapping your energy, antibiotics are not your tummy’s friend, so I had to be sure to take them with food, while keeping to the every twelve hours routine. For me, who doesn’t like to eat until close to noon, that meant forcing down something, anything, earlier, just enough to “cushion” the pill’s effect. Protein powder smoothies were my friend, although they had to be dairy free, because the prescription warnings included avoiding ingesting calcium (or other minerals) at the same time (absorption issues). Like they say, it’s complicated!

Blender from Amazon.com

My Krups blender is too big and bulky to keep out on my small kitchen counter, so I indulged myself at Amazon.com with this little Hamilton Beach blender which doubles as a travel mug. You can stick a straw in that top! I am so glad I got this; I just love it, and it has enough blending power to handle most fruits with finesse. (Dates remain a little chunky, but I just spoon those up at the end.)

Once I got the antibiotic regime under control, I proceeded to enjoy the rest of the month, as you’ll see in the slideshow below, although I didn’t do a lot of scratch cooking. I thank Lucy’s Kitchen and Market and Trader Joe’s for getting me through! Note that the striped lobster ravioli below are from TJ’s but the sauce is from Lucy’s. Crazy, huh? But I never have room to store Lucy’s frozen ravioli in my freezer, so I end up with TJ’s vacuum-packed ravioli instead; but when it comes to sauce, no one can beat Lucy’s, except (maybe) your nonna.

 (Click on any photo to start a slideshow if you want to see full-size.)