Last night I held an enormous yellow tomato up to my face, breathing in deeply.

“Just smell this,” I said, holding the tomato out to Dan. He gave me a skeptical look over his computer. Clearly, the thought of smelling a tomato wasn’t going to be enough to get him to stop tweeting.

I insisted, grabbing a peach for further confirmation. “Really, smell!”

There is no better proof of summer than the smell of a peach, or a fresh ripe tomato, or some deep red strawberries. Growing up, my family and I would spend every summer weekend at my grandparent’s house in Connecticut. My grandmother is a talented and dedicated gardener, but I have to confess I always loved the twisted patch of raspberry bushes in her vegetable garden more than any other portion of her lovingly tended land.

After an hour of picking raspberries, my sister and I would emerge scratched and itchy, unsure of whether we were covered in specks of blood or crushed raspberries. Those afternoons smelled like dirt and sun and raspberries, a perfect summer perfume.

Dan and I usually do a two-week shop. We’ll plan a fortnight’s worth of meals and lug our groceries home nearly a mile from the store. The past few weeks, however, I’ve been insisting on nearly nightly pilgrimages to the grocery store for tomatoes, peaches, and fresh corn. Our neighborhood Whole Foods has a large display of Virginia produce: heirloom tomatoes, bicolor corn, and sweet white peaches. The pull of a perfectly ripe tomato has led me back to the store night after night, and I carry my prizes eagerly back, wanting to bite into the tomatoes like someone else would a juicy, ripe apple.

My sister came down for a visit this weekend. We had big plans for our time together. We were going to go to the National Zoo, the Museum of the American Indian (for lunch), and maybe take a nighttime walk around the monuments. Instead, we spent the weekend lazing by the pool and watching the olympics. In our one burst of energy, we made the trip to Whole Foods for littlenecks, corn, and (yes) tomatoes.

Dan’s absence that weekend meant I could indulge in pasta, so we chose a recipe from the wonderful Dinner A Love Story Cookbook that called for sweet fresh corn, summer tomatoes and clams over pasta. It was a dinner that truly smelled, and tasted like, summer.

Summertime Clam Pasta (Adapted from Dinner a Love Story)

Ingredients – Serves 4

1 bag littleneck clams (ours was about 50 clams, but feel free to go with a smaller amount. That’s a lot of clams)
1 lb whole wheat spaghetti
3 cloves garlic
¾ cu dry white wine
1 onion, diced
1 large or 2 small ripe tomatoes
1 ear of corn, kernels cut off the cob with a sharp knife
Olive oil
Red pepper flakes
Handfull chopped herbs (I used parsley and basil, cause that’s what I have growing on my windowsill)

1. Clean your clams. Fill a large bowl with cold water and dump your clams in there. Swish them around in the water for a minute, then transfer the clams to a colander. Rinse any dirt out of the bowl, pour the clams back in and repeat the whole water, swish, colander process until the water is clean and silt free. (Bonus advice: if your sister is visiting at the time, this is a great task to give to someone else!)

2. Fill a large pot with water and add more salt to it than you think it should. The water should taste salty. Cover it, and bring to a boil.

3. While the water is coming to a boil, heat a tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic, onions and a few shakes of red pepper flakes and saute until onions are translucent, about five minutes.

4. When your clams are clean (good work, sister!), dump them in the garlic/onion pot. Add the white wine, and cover the pot.

5. Cook the spaghetti according to the package instructions, and drain in your (now clean!) colander.

6. In about 10-ish minutes, the clams should have all steamed open. When they have, add your tomatoes, corn and chopped herbs. Recover the pot and let simmer for another 3-ish minutes. Add the spaghetti to the mixture, and toss it all together. Serve in bowls, alongside crusty bread and (if you’re being good) a green salad.

Total Carbs: 366
Carbs per serving: 91 (Note: these serving sizes are on the larger side. Also: this is a meal to eat with your athletic sister, not your diabetic boyfriend. Meaning, pretty damn carb heavy!)