Merry Christmas In July! [WIAW]

Hello-Ho-Ho…

Merry Christmas in July!

If you’ve been following along, this week I’ve been celebrating one of my favorite parts of summer (camp) and spreading the joy of gift-giving with giveaways of the Nutty Butter and granola kind. [And I'm not done yet..] 

I’m a regular (not so) Secret Santa.*

*With not so secret split ends.

Although we know it’s more important to give than to receive, I am happy to  report that my imaginary cat was not without wrapping paper to bat around this (fake) holiday season. Not only did tickets for my favorite band of all time’s last tour arrive in the mail*…

*A present to myself, but a present nonetheless.…I received a box of my favorite protein bars–The Simply Bar–after winning a contest on Katie’s blog!With all this gift giving going on, I couldn’t help but feel the Christmas spirit translate itself into my food, too.

Salsa RED + Veggie GREEN

So, Jenn and all of the rest of you merry What I Ate Wednesday elves, I present the colors of the Christmas season in their warm-weather form.

Just because it’s too hot to turn on the oven, and the thought of eating a heavy winter meal might make your stomach turn, doesn’t mean you can’t summerize the season.

(That would be a green apple Christmas tree with Nature’s Indulgence Lemon Blueberry granola ‘star.’)

  After all, isn’t the ‘fruit of summer‘ naturally decked out in Christmas red and green?Of course, I haven’t had to cut into mine–complete with piggy tail–yet, because Rach and I are both in the habit of consuming entire watermelons on our own in periods of less than 24 hours, and I lucked into her leftover rinds last night.Call me crazy, but as much a I love the juicy center, I also love the more mild tasting ‘rindy’ part. Summer vegetables also get in on the “if only we tasted good at Christmas when our colors would be so useful for theme parties” act.

Can we talk about Papa Smart’s GINORMOUS homegrown tomatoes for a second?

Heart-shaped and "love"-ly, no?

Take some tomatoes, dice ‘em up, and quick-sear them to make a ‘sauce’ for some Cornmeal-Coated Tofu Croquettes“‘nestled all snug in their bed(s)” of holiday green zucchini.

Broken up, we might even make a case that the croquettes look like tofu snow.*

*Well, maybe snow after it’s fallen and cars have driven through it and it’s bunched up on the side of the street…but still.See? It’s really not hard to bring the Christmas spirit–or at least the seasonal colors–to your food at ANY time of the year. How will YOU celebrate Christmas in July?

Perhaps you could eat a medley of green and red bell peppers?

Or make some Watermelon Cherry Mint Salsa?*

*I just made that up. Is that a thing? It should be a thing.

You could always just eat some ice cream since it’s cold. Like winter.

Or sprinkle coconut on a grapefruit-that-looks-like-an-orange since grated coconut looks like snow.

That’s what the cool kids elves are doing.