In which we grill bread

I love panzanella. This tomato-free version made use of last month's garden asparagus. The patch is still small, but fresh asparagus is infinitely better than anything you can buy. The parsley also came from the garden. The recipe was adapted from 101 Cookbooks blog--adapted in that I grilled the vegetables and bread in my cast iron grill pan. I used green garlic from the acres growing here, and I grilled it as well. The beans are cannellini, and the dressing is just lemon, lemon zest, champagne vinegar, and extra virgin olive oil.

In which the Search begins and I bake Bread

A Sunday of baking, inside and out. It's possible that I could save energy by using the car as an oven. Cooling storms are breaking up before they reach us. The garden, pictured in its former glory and recently untended during our trip to Ireland, withers and turns brown. My plans to tame the blackberries and plant beans are on hold until the weather breaks. Cleaning out the attic, piled high with boxes from three moves to and from Charlottesville, will have to wait.

So, bread. Instead of the planned Irish brown bread, for which I ordered proper Irish coarse wheat flour, buttermilk white bread. It's probably very naughty of me to begin a vegetarian blog with white bread, so call it a guilty pleasure. We plant-eaters like our fun, too.

Brown bread seems best with soup or a good aged cheese, such as the ones we sampled some in counties Kerry and Clare. The Kerrygold butter was waiting in the fridge. As hot as it is, a simple soup seemed to fit, so I made one from green peas and potatoes. I used onions and parsley, which is somehow thriving, from the garden, and I seasoned it with smoked salt and pepper. Topped with raw milk blue cheese, it didn't seem too hearty for summer, even today.