We've been picking strawberries lately. A lot of strawberries. Organic of course. Perfectly sweet, juicy, and ripe. So, naturally, we've been eating a lot of strawberries!

We just got back from visiting family in the midwest. This recipe is one my mom likes to make often, though I have put my own twist to it. She asked me to make it one evening for dinner, but we were out of sliced almonds, which she toasts on the stove with a little bit of honey and sprinkles over the salad.

I have something for you, just in time for 4th of July celebrations.....and no cooking required! I used to think that making tarts was a complicated process, but it is really quite simple.

Today we have another guest post from a fellow blogger and friend, Hallie Klecker, who has created an amazingly simple and nutritious "cheesecake" recipe for a mini muffin pan.

Homemade jam is usually so full of sugar, but it doesn't have to be! Using Pomona's Pectin, one can make a low-sugar, honey-sweetened, or fruit juice-sweetened homemade jam. This particular pectin comes from citrus peel. The jelling is activated by calcium water (mono calcium phosphate) which comes with the pectin. It is so easy to make jam from all of your freshly picked fruit of the season. Making and canning jam is one of the great ways to preserve the harvest!

It is still strawberry season here in the Pacific Northwest. The other day I picked about five pounds of those tasty, sweet early summer morsels right from our backyard patch. If you have extra berries I suggest hulling them and freezing them on a cookie sheet to use for smoothies or strawberry lemonade throughout the summer.

Back to the blog at last! I am sharing with you today one of our favorite high protein smoothies, without protein powder! Soaked raw almonds: one of nature's most digestible vegan protein sources.

What to do when the weather gets warm? Make ice cream. We've been making "ice cream" quite often lately. Last week the temperature lingered in the low 80's for most of the week. This week has been beautiful too...in the 70's.