Best summer recipes/cookbooks for cold food.

[Guest Alte Veste Academy]

I'm going to make a serious effort this year to keep the kitchen cool by using the oven as little as possible. I'm pretty lacking in good recipes for cold food though. I don't mind boiling water for pasta, couscous, etc. to use in recipes but would like to keep cooking to a minimum. Pasta salad is actually one of our favorite meals.

 

I would love some great recipes if you have any to pass on. Of course, I dream of a wonderful summer cookbook full of cold recipes but I'm having a hard time finding more than a handful of possibilities on Amazon.

 

Thanks!

[Jen in PA]

:lurk5:

[ElizabethB]

Depending on how much your children eat, you should be able to cook enough food for the entire family in a toaster oven plugged in outside if you buy the right sized pan that just barely fits inside the oven.

 

We BBQ a lot of stuff in the summer, you can BBQ extra one day then use for leftovers.

 

1. BBQ meat with salad and your choice of starch.

 

2nd night: Fajitas with leftover meat. (You are only warming up the meat for a few minutes in a fry pan, so not adding much heat to the house.)

 

3rd night: salad with the meat and lots of your favorite veggies.

 

You can also use the leftover meat for stir fry (again, just lightly frying it, so not much heat added.)

 

If you cook meat and slice up before freezing, it thaws quickly for cooking in later meals. I don't like to make up whole meals in advance for the most part, but I like having cooked up meat on hand.

[Julie in CA]

Depending on how much your children eat, you should be able to cook enough food for the entire family in a toaster oven plugged in outside if you buy the right sized pan that just barely fits inside the oven.

 

I second this suggestion! When my family was the size/ages of yours, I used my toaster oven *all the time*. I put it outside our back door on a little tray table, and cooked all kinds of things in there. Using a crock pot or one of those plug-in roasters outside also keeps the house cool. Sorry I don't have a lot more suggestions for cold food.

[Rosie_0801]

Try some of the raw food cookbooks. That doesn't necessarily mean they are cold, but they don't require you to heat up the house. You can put salad dressing in a metal bowl in a sink full of hot water, for example. Borrow from the library if you can. Too many of those books are useless unless you have a dehydrator so it's good to see in advance. The other thing to consider is building a solar cooker. I've asked dh to make me one for Christmas. He probably won't, but I might be able to make it myself by then :)

 

Rosie

[KatieJ]

We remodeled our kitchen last summer and I was cooking in a spare bedroom. It was amazing what I could do with an electric skillet, a toaster oven and a crock pot. I have alos set up a table in my garage and cooked out there at times when I didn't want to heat up the house. You can do turkey breasts on a grill..and we have even made quessadillas on the grill. I can fit 4-6 at a time on the grill depending on how big the tortillas are. I assemble them in the kitchen and carry them outside on a big platter.

 

I have a glass top stove which takes forever to heat up water for pasta. I have discovered my electric tea kettle boils water much faster. I fill it up and boil the water and then pour it into the kettle. Pasta will actually cook with the burner being on too.

 

Another I have done in the summer is once in a while I will boil up a pot ot potatoes and another pot of hard boiled eggs. They are ready for egg salad for lunch, fried potatoes/hash for dinner, as well as potato salad.

[Guest Alte Veste Academy]

Thanks for all the great ideas! We grill a lot so I'll definitely work on making sure we're cooking extra for leftovers. I will also look into the raw cookbooks. Even if I'm not going to make it a lifestyle (DH would faint!), I'm sure there are some good recipes that will be great for summer. We can make a meal out of salad and do frequently.

 

I'll have to look into a new toaster oven. Mine died a few years ago and I hadn't used it enough to replace it and just make do with a toaster. Sounds like a good idea to look into it again though.

 

Thanks again!