Early taste experiences in summer

My father is in no way a foodie and even less of a cook. So it could perhaps be considered ironic that some of my most profound taste experiences have come from my dad’s influences. His favourite food pairings set the stage for the food I like to eat today.  Most of these noteworthy pairings developed in the summer time.  A few of them come from summers spent at a cottage on Lake Huron when I was growing up.  We would pick fresh fruit and other produce from a nearby farmer’s orchard and there would a few distinct food pairings would always make their way to the dinner table. Two examples include:

Raspberries and vanilla ice cream

No more, no less. My dad would go out of his way to get ice cream, dropping by the corner store if there wasn’t any in the freezer. There had to be ice cream, and it had to be vanilla. Raspberries shipped all the way from California? Forget it. I don’t even think this option existed when I was young. It was just fresh, tart, sweet, plump local raspberries picked within hours of being eaten.

Tomato feta salad

This little combo would appear throughout the season, and was always paired with tomatoes fresh from the vine  - either from the farm stand or from Dad’s own little vegetable garden. The recipe for this salad was as follows: slice tomatoes; arrange on a plate. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Drizzle with olive oil. Crumble feta on top.  Chop fresh chives and sprinkle on top.

Then when I came home from university one summer, I walked out on the back deck, where my Dad was enjoying a glass of wine and a snack. He poured me a glass of crisp white wine, put a little blue cheese on a thin cracker and handed it to me – “try this,” he said. It was the beginning of a love affair with cheese and wine. I think that was my first moment of really understanding why food and wine pairings existed, and it was a moment of growth – moving past sweet cocktails and chocolate martinis to actually enjoy complexity of flavour.

With summer here, I’ve been making attempts to try to slow down a bit to revisit some of these early taste experiences and remember how good these simple pairings can be.

{In this picture you can see Butternut’s nose on the far right hand corner. I put the bowl down on the chair to snap a picture and it immediately drew the kitten’s attention!}

What are your early taste experiences from summer, and have you been enjoying them lately?