It was Will’s birthday this week! I had trouble settling on a birthday meal, so the whole week became birthday meals. I didn’t tell him any of the meals and each night he would try to guess as I pulled ingredients out and started prepping. Buffalo cauliflower salad was guessed with only the chickpeas on the counter and the answer to “is it spicy?” (yes!). Burgers, fries, and falafel were easy ones, and the zucchini carb took the longest because I hid the cooked bacon under the zucchini. Now I’m jealous I don’t have a summer birthday…

Buffalo cauliflower salad. A perennial favorite. Cauliflower are starting to appear at farms in MA…get on it!

Bacon bleu cheese burgers with fries and salad. This was for Will’s actual birthday. Simple, but it is one of his favorite meals and perhaps the one I make least often at home. I mix some minced bacon into the ground beef with some salt and pepper, then cook in the cast iron since we don’t have a grill. They were topped with bleu cheese and some leftover buffalo sauce from the previous night’s salad. For the fries I followed the recipe in My Paris Kitchen. The salad is a mix of cucumber, beets, carrots, and radishes sliced thin and tossed with mint, basil, vinegar, and olive oil.

Falafel and pita. I was convinced that this would finally be the falafel recipe that I could fry without them disintegrating. Yet, I was wrong. As the first batch started to disappear in the pan I turned on the broiler and fished them out. Broiling wasn’t ideal, but it got them hot quickly.  Dinner was saved, and they were still delicious with the first tomato from our garden (!), lettuce, red onion, dilly beans, feta, and a lemon yogurt sauce.

Zucchini carbonara. Thankfully I didn’t wait until September to make this, as last year I used the last zucchini of the season to fit it in. It remains my favorite carbonara recipe, even if frying the zucchini is time consuming (you could always speed it up with multiple pans).