We are having a gorgeous summer. We have had a run of hot days and at this very moment I can see and feel the change coming. It is beautiful. The air is breezy and fresh, the house is cooling, the sky is grey and everything about it makes me feel comfortably lazy.
The hot days have been perfect. Our house has been warm, enticing us to whip up salads for lunch and dinner and ending the days sleeping to the sound of our humming fan. It is everything that takes me back to my childhood summers. To the days at the pool. To the 50 cents bags of chips with chicken salt, the sunny boys, the towels hanging over the windows that didn’t have curtains. The nights spent sleeping in the hall with the door wide open and lying on the trampoline counting the stars.
Prior to moving here we had spent many years in exceptionally hot climates. The type of places where you do not turn the air conditioning off for months on end. Where you take your children to the playground at 7am and stay inside as much as possible. Where your only outing is to the pool. I think our time in these towns has made us extremely appreciative of the four seasons. I love the changes. I love that I can wear a summer dress one day and a scarf the next. My husband makes me laugh, he has declared himself a winter man, after his years spent working in crazy heat he does not enjoy anything near or above 30 degrees. He likes the cold, the rain, but not the wind, does anyone like the wind?
I know that many of you have had a much harder time, that you have been sweltering, that the sun’s rays have crossed the pleasant line. Soon enough we will all be freezing, my Grandma will write to me and say she is experiencing the coldest winter she has ever known. I will be sleeping in my bed socks and taking very long showers.
I think we are blessed to experience the warmth of the sun, the chill of a breeze, the thundering storms, and the wild winds. To watch the clouds and guess their story, to never really know what will come next.
Pistachio and Apricot Chicken
600 grams chicken, diced
1 cup natural pistachios
1/2 cup dried apricots, quartered
juice and zest of one orange
1 lettuce
coconut oil
Zest and juice your orange. Pour the orange juice over your chicken and quickly mix, leave this to sit as you chop your apricots and measure out your pistachios.
Heat a large frying pan over medium heat, melt enough coconut oil to cover the base of the pan, approximately 2 – 3 tablespoons, add the chicken, orange juice and zest, cook, stirring occasionally, until chicken is seared on all sides, add the nuts and apricots, continue to cook and stir until all of the liquid evaporates and the chicken is cooked through and nicely browned. This takes around 10 minutes. While the chicken is cooking assemble lettuce cups on your serving plates. When the chicken mix is ready spoon it into your lettuce cups. Serve and enjoy.