Strawberries with Balsamic Vinegar
16 ounces fresh strawberries, hulled and large berries cut in half
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper or to taste
Place strawberries in bowl. Drizzle vinegar over strawberries, and sprinkle with sugar
Stir gently to combine
Cover and let sit at room temperature for at least 1 hour, but not more than 4 hours
Just before serving, grind pepper over berries.
Chilled Mango Soup 
2 mangos – diced
2 cups orange juice
2 cups plain yogurt (Greek yogurt has the most protein)
Blend until smooth. Garnish with a sprig of mint. Can also be made as a smoothie.
Grilled Bananas Foster
4 bananas, peeled and halved lengthwise
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, melted
2 tablespoons light brown sugar
1 teaspoon Pumpkin Pie spice
1 teaspoon Vanilla
1 pint vanilla ice cream
1. Place bananas in center of large sheet of heavy duty aluminum foil. Mix melted butter, brown sugar, pumpkin pie spice and vanilla until well blended. Spoon over bananas. Bring up foil sides, double fold top and ends to tightly seal packet.
2. Grill over medium heat 5 minutes or until bananas are softened, turning packet over halfway through cook time.
3. Serve with vanilla ice cream, spooning sauce from packet over bananas.
We hope you enjoy these recipes. They would be great for this weekend’s July 4th celebrations! We will have more July 4th food ideas later this week, too. There is no reason you can’t enjoy the festivities and all the amazing summer food just because you have jaw pain!
Do you have any favorite easy to eat summer recipes that your fellow patients might enjoy?
I cooked a large pot of vegetable soup with onions, garlic, green beans, carrots, frozen peas, low sodium V8 juice, a large can of petite diced tomatoes, and zucchini. I was planning on cooking them a long time to get them soft, but it was still a bit crunchy, so I blended it, and left it a little chunky, but much easier to eat.
I’ve been in burnout mode on my sis’s vedge soup, or I’d see about making some more… It’s a simple recipe we used to make once every few months when working at a 24 hour restaurant together – we’d stop at the store to pick up the ingredients, throw them in the pot while microwaving dinner, and eat the soup for two meals a day for a week, then once a day for a week or so, then we swear off it for a few months. I’ll be looking around for a way to jazz it up without making it difficult.
As is, you take your fave tomato-based soups veggies, like potato, carrots, etc, cut them up and throw them in the pot – for portion purposes, throw them in as you chop, and go in order of what cooks down the most, starting with the least. We would end with potatoes heaped up so the lid was an inch off the pot. Pour over the top a mixture of 2/3 V8 and 1/3 water. Since we never measures the veggies, how they were cut, etc we just alternated cupfuls. If you add stewed tomatoes, you can go 1/2 and 1/2 on the V8 and water, but err on the side of less water more flavor. Don’t actually cover vedge with liquid, then leave it on high while you sleep, then switch to low as soon as you wake up to the smell – by time you’ve gotten your shower it’s crunchy but edible – that evening it’s extremely soft.
We never added salt or anything else, just vedge V8 and water. As I now find myself making super-smooth egg salad with bizarre spices added just for interest, I’ll probably add spices to the soup next time, just haven’t decided what.