What to do with all these veggies???

     As summer is in full swing, and sadly on the decline of "summer vacation" all these great gardens we have all been working on are bursting at the seams with wonderful treasures.  And somehow we have gotten some great reaping of our friends glorious gardens.  (We are still waiting for some of ours to ripen).  But the question is - what do I do with all these veggies???
     We have had tomatoes in our salads, tomato salad, salsa, squash made into homemade baby food, zucchini with dinner on the side, and added chives to anything that needs seasoning.  But I still had a lot left over, and I don't like when things go to waste.  So one evening I decided (with my mom's input) to make my version of succotash.  I have only had it once and never made it myself but really it is just a bunch of veggies cut up and cooked in such a way you want to eat more.
     So my ingredients were: Sweet onion, tomatoes, yellow squash, and zucchini.  It took me about 20 minutes to prep and make this yummy side dish and I had both little ladies eating it (still working on the husband to eat more veggies)

I sliced the onions so that they remained mostly in a circular shape and placed them in the pan with some olive oil and a bit of salt to "sweat" the onions and also get them cooking more since they take longer than my other veggies

sweet Vidalia onion

     Then I chopped up the remaining veggies in to chunks, about bite size pieces.  We had to cut them smaller for the children.

yellow squash and zucchini

     I added the squash and zucchini to the pan after the onions had been cooking for about 5 minutes.  They were not transparent yet but were much softer.  I kept the chopped tomatoes to the side because they will be added in at the end since they take the least amount of time for this dish.

cooking nicely for about 5-10 minutes

    As the three veggies were cooking nicely I added some salt pepper and seasonings that I know my family loves.  I made it more of an Italian flavor with the seasonings that I put into this.  I also wanted the squash and zucchini to be warm all the way thru but not get mushy.  I wanted more of a stir fry texture to this dish.

     Lastly I added the tomatoes to the pan, and by waiting to do so at the end it created a "sauce" for the whole dish.  You get the juices from the first three veggies to combine with the tomatoes and their natural juice.  As i mentioned earlier the tomatoes take the least amount of time to heat thru and this was great because it did not take away from the firmness and texture of the squash and zucchini.  

Finished dish

    And voila! My finished dish.  Healthy, yummy, and delicious!  And you can make this with your own spin, or whatever veggies you may have on hand.  I was glad we were able to use the veggies up and have a new side to our grilled pork tenderloin.

     Now off to find a Pesto recipe and tackle all this basil we have growing in the garden.