It’s here!! Nearly in the final hour!! Have been wicked busy but still dedicated to fulfilling my self imposed duty this year to upgrade all of my 2016 fantasy feasts. It brings me joy each year seeing people reblog my old feasts especially as those posts did help me to visualize and manifest incredible magical celebrations with friends. However as time goes on my standards unfortunately get higher and my tastes more elaborate so I felt it was time to redo my Summer Solstice vision. I hope this post with included recipes below get you in a hot summery mood!
Here are the previous feasts this year: Winter Crossquarter, Spring Equinox, Spring Crossquarter (And here was Litha 2016)
In the read more there are the recipe links and additional explanations on personal symbolism and of course the image credits! I also always plan my feasts to be vegan inclusive for those with dietary restrictions but also aim for all the food to be somewhat local which matters in these seasonal feasts since it’s celebrating local nature. Anyway there is something for everyone here.
1: Starters
The ideal Summer Solstice feast to me is a mad fiery pagan bonfire bbq. If we are talking about a celebration honoring the fiery sun, summertime and food, my mind goes to a grill. However most BBQs can end up getting heavy quickly. Therefore the starters are a bit light. There will be charred vegetable skewers, steamed seafood, shrimp cocktail and jalapeno poppers. Honorable mention would be blistered padron peppers.
Garlic Herb roasted Shrimp with homemade Cocktail sauce recipe
Balsamic Grilled Veggie Skewers Recipe
Seafood image Source
(I would ideally want to serve just steamed seafood. The image is from a Paella recipe which is very summery but Paella is definitely a main dish and not a starter).
2: Sides
The bread choice for this feast will be focaccia with sundried tomatoes and garden herbs. Other dishes will be charred bell peppers, and a refreshing cucumber tomato salad.
Chili herb tomato focaccia bread recipe (vegan with olives image source)
Homemade Roasted Bell Peppers Recipe
Cucumber Tomato Salad Recipe
3: Mains
The grill would provide a selection of food, but the main feature would be marinated barbeque ribs. The plant based option would be stuffed grilled bell peppers with smoked paprika.
Stuffed Bell Peppers image source (there’s no vegan recipes online that I find satisfying so I would prepare this with sautéed pinto beans with red onions in tomato sauce, smoked paprika, coriander and topped with a dash of chili flakes and oat crème fraiche).
Marinated Ribs Source (Beer-b-q ribs recipe)
4: Desserts
Summer is the fruity season!! We start to see more fruits in season towards the Summer crossquarter harvest, yet Summer Solstice sees strawberries and in some regions melons start to ripen. Other fruits I associate with this sabbat are light citrus flavors from Lemon, Grapefruit and Lime. Also since I was raised in NJ a regional summery treat we have are orange creamsicles. It’s a dreamy creamy citrus delight and has a special place in my heart so I feel like since it evokes summer so well for me it deserves a spot here.
For each sabbat dessert I have a tart of choice, a cake of choice and a special dish. The tart for Summer Solstice is torn between a fresh strawberry tart and a lemon meringue, but I would ultimately choose a lemon meringue tart with flamed mallow topping. The cake would be strawberry shortcake, and the special dessert would be an icecream cake (could change flavors per year but would mostly be orange creamsicle). Alternatives provided would be ice cream cookies as they are easy to make with vegan options/dietary restrictions and in different variety of flavors to suit peoples pallets. Also if you are in a region where it’s available, definitely a watermelon fruit salad. Watermelon was such a big part of summer in NJ but in England its like out of region so it’s mostly strawberries over here.
Curly Dock and Strawberry Balsamic Tart Wondersmith recipe
Simple Strawberry Shortcake Recipe
Lemon Meringue Tart
Icecream Sandwiches source (simple ice cream sandwich recipe)
Icecream Sandwich Bars vegan
Orange Creamsicle Icecream Cake Recipe
Strawberry Shortcake Icecream Cake (I was obsessed with these icecream bars as a kid)
5: Drinks
Fruits really make their way into everything during summertime and the drink selection would reflect this. Only thing not pictured here would be an elderflower fresh mint iced tea which will be cooling and refreshing to counter act all the hot and spicy foods. Other than that of course the main non-alcoholic drink will be lemonade!
For the alcoholic selection I would love Strawberry wine, boozy melon bowls and grapefruit shandies (shoffenhofer tastes like summer on tap it will change your life). The spirit of choice will be tequila. Something about tequila is so fiery, summery and solar. I would make spicy mezcal sunset margaritas and flamed tequila shots.
Dragon Lemonade Holder
Strawberry Wine Recipe
Grapefruit Shandy Recipe (Shoffenhofer)
Boozy melon Bowl (the Recipe is for Subak Hwachae which is a Korean boozy bowl with Soju)
Spicy Sunset Margarita Recipe
6: Treats
Final part!! You can tell I am a very sensory person and one thing that made celebrations and holidays memorable as a kid were always the treats you walked away with. The little candies, snacks and tokens. If I were to have a celebration with a whole community including kids I would include some of these. Summery sweets for me were salt water taffy, fruity gummies (especially shark gummies), sticky sun drops on paper and fruity candies with melon, strawberry and citrus flavors. For savory options I would love spicy and smoky treats from fiery chili chips to smoked paprika crisps.
Salt Water Taffy (Recipe)
Shark Sour Gummies
Fruit Candy Selection
Flaming Hot Party Mix
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If you made it this far thank you so much for reading it all!! Hope I put you on a visual sensory experience for the summer. I would love to hear what dishes and foods you associate with the summer solstice or summer time in general.
You can check my litha tag for more ideas or my correspondence list for why I associate certain things with this time of year.
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Image Credits:
Litha Art by Julia Nikitina
Bonfire Party
Lemon Beeswax Candles
Summer tablescape
Bonfire gif
Grill
Gold and Red tent
Flames
Fire Dancers
Fire Breather Gif - From me actually! It was my first summer solstice party and there were fire breathers. I took this video.
Bilbo Baggins Birthday (Lets be real, the ultimate summer solstice party would be that shire party)
Fruit Bowls
Fireflies gif
Flaming Shots
Grapefruit Cocktail
Beach Sunset
Midsummer =/= Litha/summer solstice. They are SUPER similar and definitely related but they are not the same holidays and don’t fall on the same day. I always say Midsummer to Litha is like Christmas to Yule. Both Midsummer and Christmas are on the 25th of their respective months (Actually Midsummer is the 24th sorry haha. It just passed this sunday!) and they both have some christian elements but also some magical lore behind it. Midsummer is also known as St. John’s Day or St. John’s eve and is a feast day dedicated to that guy by the church. It’s obviously not originally christian, but its a holiday that has been christianized.
Midsummer is the holiday where they roll the wheels set on fire down hills to signify the sun now beginning it’s ‘lessening’ on this time of year. You also have bonfires but not with the intention to honor the sun or summer. It was more for cleansing. In historical lore St. John’s Fires were made out of bones and wood and it was to chase away dragons that would poison the wells. Of course since that era of christianity had no chill it then became to chase away witches and evil spirits or whatever but jokes on them cause witches be celebrating this holiday the most lol.
Like it’s cool to pair the two (I often do) and midsummer is very magical but don’t spread the idea that they are the same exact thing. I love how neopaganism is all about resurrecting old traditions to get people back in touch with nature yet often in this community misinformation spreads in the attempt to revive certain practices but midsummer has been celebrated and observed as it’s own thing for years and just knowing this little detail is important and doesn’t erase some history. Midsummer is not the longest day of the year since it’s usually 4-5 days after the solstice. Midsummer has it’s own traditions that are very similar to Litha but it’s not the same. Like I said, I love combining Yule and Christmas and having a week long wintery festive holiday mood and I do the same for Litha and Midsummer (especially since midsummer is said to be a time of high fairy activity and where I come from would have so many fireflies around now I’d have a midsummer garden dinner party with a yard fully alight and blinking but England has no fireflies I am so sad ;-;). Midsummer is a big deal in a lot of scandinavian countries, when I used to live in NYC there was always some swedish group doing big festivals by the water in the wall street area for midsummer. I sadly never got the chance to go but if you have a large finnish or swedish community by you they will be celebrating it like it’s the biggest deal. It’s basically summer’s christmas for them.
Here is the main post for all of my recipes and my litha correspondences and tag. My correspondences might help you to understand my decision to pick certain themes! Litha is the celebration of summer and fire and the joys of life and no celebration is complete without delicious sweets! Here is a list of recipes and sweets to buy for the summer solstice!
{🌻 = Vegan}
Basic lemon curd tart
Easy No Bake Lemon Curd Tart 🌻
Orange Creamsicle Cake
Orange Creamsicle Icecream Cake
Classic Key Lime Pie
Upside Down Pineapple Cupcakes
Upside Down Blood Orange cake
Upside Down Citrus Cake 🌻
Strawberry Short Cake Icecream Bars
No Churn Ice Cream Recipes (10 flavors)
Easy Fruit Sorbet 🌻
Strawberry Parfait (Can easily be substituted for any other summer fruit too like watermelon, orange creamsicle or honeydew!)
melon kiwi jello cups
Lemon Gum Drops 🌻
Orange Creamsicle Gummies
Orange Creamsicle Truffles
Flaming Lolipops 🌻
sweets ideas to buy:
shark gummies
salt water taffy
swedish fish
lemon drops
I've been flooding my feed with recipes but of course no great celebration is without drinks!
Here are some drink recommendations to enjoy the longest and sunniest day of the year!
Iced teas
Sun Tea Iced Tea!
Sun tea is a very simple process. Get a clear mason jar and fill with water, tea bags and fruits! Let the sun infuse your tea! Here is a basic recipe link.
Favorite tea blends are:
roobios and strawberry
Hibiscus with raspberries and orange slices
Black tea with lemon
Add simple syrup after and served it iced to enjoy on a hot day!
Strawberry Iced Tea
Mojito inspired Iced Tea
Watermelon Iced Tea
Hibiscus Lemongrass and Basil Honey Sweet Iced Tea
Other Drinks
Lemonade!
Just good old fashioned Lemonade!
Mermaid Lemonade
Orange Creamsicle Float
Alcoholic
wines
Rose
Home Made Strawberry Wine
Strawberry Rose Sangria
Melon ball Sangria
Watermelon Sangria
Lemonade Sangria
Passion Fruit Sangria
These can all be done as punch with white rum and syrup if you don’t like the taste of wine!
cocktails
Tangerine Cocktail
Orange Tumeric Margarita
Grapefruit Shandy
[grapefruit soda + grapefruit pressed juice + wheat beer] or Shoefferhofer!
Champagne with grand marnier, orange slices and or orange juice!
Orange Creamsicle Mimosa
Orange Creamsicle Cocktail
10 cocktails you can light on fire
liquors
Honey Jack Daniels
Grand Marnier
Mead
Infusions
Steep Lemon and Oranges, honey and Orange Habenero peppers in Tequila for two nights. Serve with lemon wedge.
Let mango slices, passion fruit, brown sugar and a drop of matouk sauce sit in Rum for a week. Shake daily. Serve with syrup if you want it to be sweeter
