The summer season is in full swing now and you probably are looking for Jewish recipes for cool and refreshing meals and snacks. Fortunately there are thousands of recipes that are designed for summer eating. These recipes are not only generally healthy for you, but they are also very tastey.

One of my favorite summer dishes is cold noodle salad. It is made by cooking ramen noodles and then topping it with a dressing made from peanut butter, vinegar and a little curry. You mix the peanut butter/curry vinegrette in a bowl and then pour it over your noodles. Then you chill the bowl for two to three hours to allow the noodles time to soak up the dressing.

Another tasty and refreshing summer dish is a simple melon salad. To create this dish all you have to do is select your favorite melons, ball them, and place the pieces in a bowl. You can serve this salad plain or with a dollop of fat-free sour cream mixed with mint.

Do you have summer recipes that you would like to share? What about memories about a summer cookout? Post your stories and recipes below and start a dialog.

June is the first official month of summer. It is a great month to start taking advantage of fresh produce from local growers. You can use this fresh produce to make parve Jewish recipes. If you don’t know what a parve recipe is, it is simply a recipe that is made without animal products.

A simple parve recipe that you can make is a compote. A compote is a fruit stew. You can serve this fruit stew as a stand alone treat, you can use it as a spread or your can use it as a topping for a desert. Fruits that work well in compotes include rhubarb, strawberries, grapes, pineapple, berries, peaches and pears.

Another simple parve dish that you can make is poached fruit. Poaching fuit enhances the natural sweetness of the fruit and makes it more of a dessert than raw fruit. Fruits that can be poached include pears and apples. You can serve these fruits plain, with their own juice or you can create a caramel glaze. A chocolate sauce can also be very tasty when served over poached fruit. You can make this sauce healthier by using a sugar free recipe.

If you want a parve desert that has a dairy flare then make dairy dishes with soy milk instead of cow’s milk. Soy milk is lower in fat, it is a good source of fiber and it is a good source of calcium. Soy milk can be purchased in a variety of flavors from mocha to chocolate to plain.

In just a couple of weeks the Memorial Day weekend will be upon us. This is the official kick off for the summer season. However, it is also a holiday when families tend to get together to remember those loved ones that have passed away. If you are planning a family get-together for Memorial Day then consider preparing traditional Jewish recipes.

One group of traditional Jewish recipes that work well for Memorial Day picnics and family dinners are for beef brisket. Barbecue recipes for beef brisket are particularly popular for Memorial Day. However, serving the same recipes year after year can be a little boring. This year be a little more adventurous and try a new brisket recipe. For example, you can use a new type of barbecue sauce, you can smoke the brisket instead of grilling it or you can use a dry rub instead of a wet rub.

In addition to preparing a large meat dish you will also want to serve several side dishes. To keep things healthy try mixing up low calorie sides that are full of fresh produce. For example, instead of serving a fruit salad made with canned fruit cocktail and whipped topping, serve a bowl of fresh mixed berries with low fat whipped topping. This will cut the amount of sugar that your guests eat without sacrificing any of the flavor. You can also serve a variety of healthy salads like a mixed greens salad, a three bean salad and a low fat chicken salad.

What’s your favorite Memorial Day recipe? Post them below.

Organic foods have many advantages. The first is that they don’t contain added hormones, antibiotics or pesticides. This means that organic foods are much healthier than non-organic foods, and that they are less likely to cause negative health side effects.

Organic food is becoming easier to find. Produce is perhaps the easiest to find as an organic product. Local grocers usually keep their organic produce grouped together. If you can’t find it ask the grocery clerk in the produce section if they have an organic produce section. If they don’t then check out local health food stores, who usually offer organically grown produce.

Organic meat is another items that you will want to add to your shopping list. Organic meat is healthier to eat than regular meat because the animals are fed on natural vegetation that has not been treated with inorganic pesticides and fertilizers. Also the animals have not been fattened up with growth hormones or fed antibiotics. If you can’t find local organic meat sources look to game farms, like bison farms. These animals are usually certified organic. Not only are organic meats healthier to eat, but they also taste great in traditional Jewish recipes.

Chicken Noodle Soup – Homemade

Ingredients

Directions

Start by plugging in your crock pot and placing a cleaned, whole chicken into the crock pot. Fill the crock pot with water so that the chicken is covered. Add in 1 stalk of chopped celery, salt and pepper, ½ cup of chopped carrots, cilantro and fresh parsley.

Simmer the chicken until the meat starts to fall off the bone. You can put the chicken in the crock pot in the morning and pull it out when you get home from work.

Remove the chicken from the crock pot and allow it to cool. Remove the meat from the chicken and chop the meat into bite sized pieces. Strain the stock and return the purified stock to the crock pot. Add in the meat, the reserved carrots and one stalk of celery. Taste the broth and reseason as needed. Pour in the egg noodles. Cook until noodles and carrots are tender. This makes a great dish to help you recover from the calories consumed from Jewish holiday recipes.