Bacon Caprese Salad and Fried Patty Pan Squash

Summer is quickly winding down, but tomatoes and squash are still plentiful.  This summer has been hard on my vegetable garden.  Extreme heat and humidity most of the summer stunted production.  At other times, drought lasted several weeks at a pop.  Only the hardy survived but even so, the fruit of the vines was sweet and far better than any store-bought varieties.


After a brief respite from the heat last week, we are back to temperatures in the 90s.  At least it is fairly dry - as dry as the mid-Atlantic area gets in August.  I ventured out to the garden this afternoon and picked basil, some nice little red tomatoes, and a couple of patty pan squash.  I had a pack of sugar-free bacon in the fridge, some mozzarella, and some balsamic vinegar - just the ingredients I needed to build a Caprese Salad.  Everything is better with bacon, so why not add that to the recipe?

Fry the sliced pattypan in the bacon grease, add a little salt and pepper, and voila!  It's easy to build the salad.  Make the bacon, slice the tomatoes and mozzarella, and chop the basil.  Reduce some balsamic vinegar in a saucepan to concentrate the flavor.  Stack the bacon, mozzarella, tomato, basil.  Place some squash on the side.  Drizzle with balsamic. Done!  Enjoy!