There is a lot you can do with zucchini. Many people will probably end up baking them in the oven – if all goes well, topped with plenty of cheese. ;P We like to use them to cook delicious Zucchini Chutney whenever possible. Chutneys are super easy to prepare and can be added to many dishes. We always have some kind of chutney or relish in the fridge. ;P
Around Christmas, there is no way to get around this spice mix when baking – a Gingerbread Spice Mix can be used for many baked goods. Many supermarkets sell the spice mix these days, but with a few common spices you can mix your own blend quickly and easily at home. Without gingerbread spice, the Christmas season would be only half as delicious ;)
Gooseberries don’t have a particularly long season here in Germany – once you can find them on the local farmer’s market, it doesn’t take long for them to take a break again until next year. To be able to enjoy these little fellas a little longer, we like to cook a simple Gooseberry Chutney. Once this is in the glass jars, you have a tasty side dish »sauce« for many months.
If you have a garden at home, you will certainly have planted cucumbers – at least once. Right?! Cucumbers are really uncomplicated plants that don’t require a lot of attention. We have often grown them in large flower pots and been successful every time. So much success that we have even been able to make Homemade Pickled Gherkins several times already. What could be better than being able to use your own vegetables for something like that ;)
Anyone with a garden (lucky you!) will certainly be familiar with this type of situation – you are taking care of your plants for months and then (suddenly) they are all ready to harvest. All at the same time. Now you have more veggies than you can possibly eat. So what can you do? You don’t want anything to go to waste, right? Well… you could give the veggies to friends, or you could freeze or pickle some veggies! In case you have a lot of bell peppers this summer, for example, you should take a look at this recipe for Pickled Grilled Peppers. Pickling is one of the best ways to preserve veggies for several months without much effort ;)
Simple noodles with pesto are probably one of the most popular pasta dishes. They are normally ready in no time without much effort. I suspect, however, that many people will go for store-bought pesto because they don’t want to invest the extra work for homemade pesto… even though it’s super easy to make and most of the time so much better when made fresh than anything you can buy in a supermarket ;P Best example – this simple and delicious Homemade Arugula Pesto aka. Pesto Verde. Ready in less than 5 minutes. Pasta normally takes longer than that to cook… ;)
I love my job, but in between I love to bake and try new things in the kitchen. A lot of my friends and colleagues encourage me to bake - for a very simple reason: they get the leftovers - and it seems they like it most of the time ;) 
