A Summer Friday

It's Friday and we had a wonderful rain Thursday morning. A life giving rain to some of the plants that were dying of thirst! It meant that watering was not a Thursday morning chore.

The heat has been hard on the blooming plants in the garden and for most of the year we like a small bouquet of flowers on the breakfast room table. It brightens our meals -- most of which we take at that table.

But when the garden doesn't give me flowers . . .

I'm forced to purchase them. But when I do, I like natural looking flowers, flowers that look like that could have come from the garden. This week's flowers -- yellow mums that look more like daisies. Plunked in one of my Spode Blue and White pitchers so that they've got that blowsy look that garden flowers have.

It's Friday and I'm joining Liz at Rose Vignettes for Fresh Cut Friday.

My herbal garden luncheon had a wonderful lavender lemon cake for dessert. With a blueberry lavender syrup and fresh blueberries for garnish.

Decorated with a sprig of garden lavender. Baked in my little bundt pans. It's a lemon yogurt poundcake that I make "all the time" and often have one in my freezer for you never know when a pound cake loaf will come in handy!

They made a smashing dessert for my Herbal Luncheon!

LEMON LAVENDER POUNDCAKE WITH BLUEBERRY LAVENDER SAUCE

1 1/2 c. flour

2 t. baking powder

1/2 t. kosher salt

1 cup Greek honey vanilla yogurt

1 c. sugar

1 1/2 c. flour

3 eggs

2 t. grated lemon zest

1/2 t. vanilla

1/2 c. vegetable oil

1/3 c. freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 T. dried lavender

Preheat oven to 350. Grease an 8 1/2 by 4 1/4 by 2 1/2 inch loaf pan. Line the bottom with parchment paper. Grease and flour the pan.

Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt into 1 bowl. In another bowl, whisk together the yogurt, 1 cup sugar, the eggs, lemon zest and vanilla. Slowly whisk the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. With a rubber spatula, fold the vegetable oil into the batter, making sure it's all incorporated. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for about 50 minutes, or until a cake tester placed in the center of the loaf comes out clean.

BLUEBERRY LAVENDER SAUCE

3/4 c. water

1/2 c. sugar

4 t. dried edible lavender flowers

2 t. fresh lemon juice

1 pint blueberries

Bring water and sugar to a boil in a small saucepan, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and stir in lavender, then steep 30 minutes. Pour syrup through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl, discarding lavender. Stir in lemon juice and blueberries.

Spoon berries and syrup over slices of cake just before serving.

NOTE: This is a favorite poundcake without the lavender. If you don't serve it with a blueberry lavender syrup, just take 1 cup powdered sugar and 2 T. lemon juice and glaze the cake. I also baked mine in little bundt cake pans so I could serve individual little cakes. You could also bake it in 4 small loaf pans. Adjust the baking time downwards.

The tomatoes are coming in by leaps and bounds. Overflowing big boxes of tomatoes abound at the Farmer's Market and we've been gifted with bags of tomatoes as well. It has definitely been a tomato year.

To go along with our spaghetti and meatballs, we enjoyed roasted tomato slices topped with pesto and Parmesan. It's an easy recipe, would work well in the winter when the store tomatoes "need a little help" and is full of flavor.

I'm joining Michael at Designs by Gollum for Foodie Friday and I'm joining Ashton at Something Swanky for Sweet Treats Thursday.