Summer Al Fresco Menu from Vegan Planet

I made this earlier this week for family night, to mark the end of summer. Well, technically I made this menu on the second day of autumn. But I had been on call and working the last few days of summer, and in all honesty it was a 30 degree day, so it was still feeling summery to us! Unfortunately, this was not eaten al fresco, as my mother is so heat-phobic that as the night was pretty warm we had to stay in with the airconditioning. *brrrrrrr*



The first course was Roasted Corn Chowder. It is made by roasting cobs of corn and then cutting off the kernels to put into the soup, and it is so yummy! The smell of corn roasting in the oven is sensational. It keeps really well too, and I had the left overs two days later for lunch with a grilled cheese sandwich to dip. Yum! I highly recommend this.



The first component of the main course was Rosemary-Lemon Potatoes with Black Olives and Sundried Tomatoes. This is really great, possibly because I am addicted to all things potato, but I think everyone would love it! The potatoes are boiled, cut and then fried until starting to brown. It makes a fairly small amount to split for side dishes.



The other part of the main course was Garlic and Herb-Marinated Vegetable Kabobs. The vegetables were mushrooms, fennel, zucchini, golden shallots and cherry tomatoes. The original recipe called for capsicum, but to that I saw ewwww and I subbed the tomatoes. It is also only the second time I have used fresh fennel, which I am really liking! The recipe calls to make eight kabobs - one of each vegetable on each skewer. Maybe my skewers are really long, but it looked ridiculous so I made 4 skewers with two of each on it. The combination of the vegetables and the marinade was fabulous.



And here it is all together with some nice leafy greens, because there must always be green stuff. If I made this again I would double the amount of vegetables so everyone could have two big kabobs. The single kabob on each plate looked a bit lonely. Plus I am a hungry little vegan and I need my foodage!



The meal ended with Fresh Peach Crisp with Almond Butter Cream. Delicious. I really like the fresh peach taste in the crisp, much better than using tinned peaches! The almond cream was also really nice, but use a food processor rather than the blender mentioned in the recipe to smoosh it up or it won't be creamy enough. I also had some with my waffles this morning, and it was yummy!

It was pretty fun to make. Just don't forget to marinate the vegetables ahead of time! I got a little distracted. And it was very nice to eat.

So farewell summer, and hello autumn.