Rainbow Potluck Bonanza!!!

Hooorah! It's time for another Double Rainbow Potluck Party! 

The double rainbow potluck party rules are as follows:

*) We attempt to  create a savory dish and a sweet dish for every color of the rainbow.

*) Each attendee must commit to one or two dishes (example: "red savory" &/or "green sweet")

*) Bonus points for wearing clothes the color of the dish you brought OR wearing garish rainbow clothing!
*) No food coloring! Try to use seasonal food if possible, but only use food-based colors for affect!

*) Friendly and generous attitude toward the culinary creations of others!

This year's potluck was more intimate than some previous years - for various reasons, a few of our most esteemed Rainbow Potluck regulars were not able to come. But worry not! We invited cool news friends and even made a fun brand new friend-to-be!

  

Red Savory: Tomato and Basil Pizzas on Cornmeal Crusts

This is one of our very favorite summer meals - it's so simple and really lets the ingredients shine all on their own. For the pizza crusts, I used the organic cornmeal pizza crusts from Vicolo. They come in the refrigerated section and they are incredibly delicious. They also come in a gluten-free variation, so I made one of those for our GF guest as well! I make these very simple: fresh pressed garlic, a dash of olive oil, a ginormous load of julienned fresh basil, and then thinly sliced dry-farmed tomatoes... all topped with a little pinch of finishing salt. Oh my goodness, it's all so delicious. I could eat ten of these! 

Red Sweet: Chocolate-Dipped Strawberries

I usually dip more of the berry into the chocolate, but I wanted more of the redness to be on display. Why are chocolate-covered strawberries so perfect? What a delicious combination, and so easy to make (and easy to eat!)

Orange Savory: Orange Tacos! 

One year, when I was in charge of green, I made all-green tacos. So this year I made all-orange tacos. I made orange Pico de Gallo salsa using orange hot peppers and orange tomatoes from the farmers market. Next I made Fajitas, using the recipe from The Taco Cleanse. I used only orange bell peppers for extra orangy-ness! And then I made orange tortillas - I don't think you can tell in this photo, but they turned out a pretty nice orange tone. To get the orange hue, I pureed roasted red bell peppers and sundried tomatoes in the water that I added to the masa. It worked great! 

Orange Sweet: Grilled Peach-Plum-Apricot Hybrids (!)

I planned to make a fancy almond cake with these fruits, but it was pretty much a total disaster. It was actually kinda yummy, but it totally collapsed, and the fruits sunk down entirely out of sight... ha ha. I needed a last minute idea! So, I cut them in half and grilled them. I love grilled stone fruits - it really brings out the sweetness in a nice way. 

Yellow-Orange Savory: Curry! 

Check out the color on this beautiful curry!! This was so delicious - with lovely seasoning and full of veggies. We wanted a couple more people at our party, so our friends M & M were like "we know JUST the right person!" Ha ha. Their wonderful pal showed up with this totally excellent offering, full of good cheer and was a really delightful presence at our party! How fun that it all worked out in such a great way. I hope we get to hang out with her again. :)

100% Yellow Savory: Saffron Rice

She also brought this beautiful pot of truly yellow Saffron Rice to go along with the curry - and it was really excellently yellow!! Altogether, an excellent offering for Yellow Savory! 

Yellow Sweet: Chai Cookies with Apricot Jam

Our friend, and trusted alumna of every rainbow potluck, Alana brought these *delicious* and surprisingly yellow cookies! I don't remember exactly how she described them except that it was a long list of ingredients that pretty much sounded like my dream cookie: nutty, apricot jam, chai spices... they were beautiful and tasty, and happily, she left a bunch for us at the end of the evening. So we were enjoying them for a few days! YUM. 

Green Savory: A Truly Green Salad

You know how we always call it "green salad"? Well I decided to make a totally literal all-green salad. I thought of everything green to put in: lettuce, green bell peppers, cucumber, celery, steamed broccolini, avocado, green tomatoes, and hemp seeds -- all topped with green goddess dressing (the recipe from Appetite for Reduction). That green goddess dressing is one of my favorites. I make it all the time! In general, I am a strong believer in having a proper salad at every potluck. It just makes me feel good to have a good dose of salad along with all the sweeties and treats and special foods. 

Green Sweet: Kale Cake (unpictured!)

Oh no! I can't believe I didn't get a picture of the kale cake (hangs head in shame). Our beloved pal K brought her famous kale cake! She says that it doesn't actually have a ton of kale in it, but it has enough kale to turn green! Kale really packs a green punch like that. Ha ha. This year she made it gluten-free and wasn't sure about it, but it was really good! And it had a really great icing made with applesauce, a nice fruity flavor combination with the cake. So fun! 

Blue Savory: Blue Corn Chips with blue hummus and blue salsa

Blue Sweet: Blueberry Crisp! (at the very top of the picture)

Our excellent friends M&M came to the rainbow potluck for the first time... and when I sent out the group text to see which colors people wanted to sign up for - they bravely responded within minutes "We'll take blue sweet and savory!" WHAT. Most years, everyone avoids blue and I get stuck with blue! ha ha. I applaud their sassy confidence!

Blue is notoriously difficult in foods - but they did a noble attempt (even if the result was a little more on the purple spectrum, hee hee) - and their offerings were very tasty! Along with the blue corn chips were two really creative dips: a salsa made with dark tomatoes, purple cabbage, and black beans - it was beautiful and yummy! The other dip was a hummus variant - I think they said that it even had potatoes in it! 

For blue sweet, they brought along a blueberry crisp - an excellent way to make friends and influence people! ha! You just really can't go wrong! It was SO good! 

Purple Savory: Israeli Couscous with Purple Madness!

Alana also brought this excellent and hearty purple couscous dish - it was so fun and playful: huge Israeli couscous (why is this such a perfect food?? so fun to eat!) with kidney beans, purple cabbage, purple onions... all full of purple veggies, and full of flavor too. I think she must have just innovated this recipe... and in addition to being a celebration of purple-ness, it was also so tasty and satisfying. 

Purple Sweet: Concord Grape Pie

For purple sweet, I got creative and made a Concord Grape Mini-Pie. I used my lovely little mini-pie pan that makes a half-sized pie. I love it for those times when you don't want to be left with a huge amount of pie!

I had recently canned some grape juice, using the Concord Grapes from my aunt's garden. It's so good and SO intense, and also extremely purple. I was thinking of a lemon meringue pie... but with grapes! I kinda roughly used a recipe from Deborah Madison, but then I realized it wouldn't work vegan... so I went off the rails. I added some agar, some kudzu, and some arrowroot ... I was SO happy with the result! I wish I'd taken better notes on what I did! The texture was great: it held together, but it wasn't too firm either - the consistency was really smooth. It was EXTREMELY grapey and actually pretty intense. I think next time I would add a little more sugar? Also, after I had made it, Musty made a comment in passing about a peanut butter and jelly pie! What if I had used peanut butter in the crust??? That would have been amazing. Maybe I will experiment again with this in the future.

Clouds: So Delicious CocoWhip! 

Going way back to the very first rainbow potluck, we sometimes always like to have some offerings for the clouds at the end of the rainbow. Happily, I wanted to get some CocoWhip to go with the grape pie and the grilled stone fruits... so it was a perfect cloudy fit. Warning: this stuff is very, very good.

My Rainbow Dinner Plate! 

Of course I arranged my food in rainbow order!!! Is there really any alternative? 

Just look at all this glorious bounty!!! Everything that our friends brought was truly delicious - we are lucky to have such excellent friends who are also good cooks! 

My Rainbow Dessert Plate!

Oh! Here you can see my piece of green kale cake! Red orange yellow green blue purple desserts!!! How fun is that??? Obviously, the rainbow potluck is extremely fun. We were a little later in the season this year, but I'm so glad we made it happen! We all stayed up late having such fun conversations, sharing ideas, and eating all this delicious food. Huzzah! Would celebrate again.