Monday: A bountiful breakfast

It was a bit of a challenge for me to figure out how to feed all our houseguests in the morning.

The young ones stayed up until all hours playing cards and slept late; we old folks nodded off and then got up earlier. Some of our company are the kind who are hungry right away while others need numerous cups of coffee before the thought of breakfast even occurs to them. On top of that, one person has a dairy allergy, one is on a low-carb diet, one has to have eggs and one is watching his cholesterol.

For my own family, breakfast is always a do-it-yourself affair on weekdays and often on weekends as well, when everyone fixes what they want whenever they decide it’s time to eat. On special occasions or when there are guests in the house, I try to make a bigger spread with variety enough to satisfy everyone. Personally, I am not too interested in food in the morning, but I felt I ought to do something in the hostess line this weekend for those who like something more than a cup of coffee before noon.

On Saturday morning (after we got the coffee pot going, of course) I mixed up a batch of dried cherry muffins, made with fruit we picked last year on a family trip to a U-pick orchard and dried in our electric food dryer. While those were in the oven, I cut up a local melon that Andreas had bought on Friday at the Farmer’s Market store in Phoenix, where they always have local products, usually labeled as such. Andreas talked with the friendly store owners on Friday about the Eat Local Challenge, and he reports that they were extremely helpful with showing him the best they have in the way of local produce.

While I worked on the muffins, Andreas went out into the garden where the day was already starting to heat up and picked a big bowl of squash blossoms. We love zucchini blossoms; they are a special summer treat. But we also like zucchini, and we worry that taking too many blossoms might harm the crop, so this year we allowed some of the stray mixed variety plants that arise unbidden out of the compost to take root and grow.

The hybrid fruit is generally pretty useless. My thrifty spouse is undaunted in his efforts to make something edible out of them, but they tend to have very thick skin, big seeds and not very tasty flesh. However, the flowers are delicious. One of my favorite lunches at home is to dip them in lightly beaten egg , dredge them in flour seasoned with a little salt and pepper, and then fry them in butter until light brown and a little crispy. But Andreas had other plans for the flowers on Saturday: He cut them up and made a giant squash blossom and chopped onion frittata.

Sunday’s breakfast was similar. There were still muffins left from yesterday, and we had fruit (melon, berries and peaches). But today, instead of the frittata, Andreas made a big vegetable scramble, with sauteed zucchini, tomatoes, onions, basil and bell peppers, all from the garden. When it was done we just set everything out and people wandered in to take what they were interested in. A couple of people asked for fruit juice, and I realized we were lacking there. If I owned a juicer, I could probably have made a pear or peach juice. When we harvest the rest of the grapes, we’ll probably use the big steam juicer that goes on the stove to make grape juice, but that will be later this month and there is none left from last year.

Similarly, I was not able to satisfy the bacon-and-sausage crowd this time. I’ve been watching for locally produced pork products with no luck so far. This is something else I will try to investigate more thoroughly before next weekend. Ah, well. No one is going to starve around here, anyway.

Pass the coffee.