Indian Summer Picnic



            After several weeks of rainy and cool fall-like weather, the past five days have been full of sunshine and above average temperatures.  With the thermometers steadily rising above 80 degrees, Indiana is in the midst of an Indian summer.  The warm weather brought with it a stuffy nose and sore throat in my case….go figure.  That’s ok though, because I’ll take this warm sunshine any day......although it looks like I only have a few day of it left, because a cool front is coming in on Tuesday.

            Since this warm weather won't last forever, Matt and I wanted to take advantage of it for our weekly date, so we planned to meet at the park after he got off of work tonight for a warm autumn picnic.  Not to mention, making a nice dinner myself and packing it in picnic basket to enjoy somewhere outdoors, is more than half the cost of dining at a restuarant for our weekly date. 
           Dinner was certainly yummy, and enjoying it outdoors made it even better!  Using wonderful harvest vegetables, I made roasted garlic, sweet potato, broiled eggplant and bell pepper salad with mozzarella (yes, that is the official title in the book I got the recipe from) along with a roasted sweet potato, squash and garlic soup.  A cold glass of sparkling apple cider made dinner all the more festive and refreshing.  When we got home, I had zucchini brownies with vanilla ice-cream waiting for us.  I will be sharing all of these recipes with you in the next few days, but for now a few pictures will just have to do……..