Casting about for variety in meal plans I sometimes fall back on old tried-and-true recipes stored in my head, filed away for future use. One recipe that rises on the rare occasion to remind me that its flavourful taste is well worthwhile repeating from time to time is an onion-tomato-cheese pie.

So that's just what we had for dinner yesterday, a bright, sunny but cool day when we needed light jackets for our morning walk in the woods. Cooler night time temperatures that come with early Fall make for more comfortable sleep. We might as well enjoy this moderation as long as we can before late fall and winter erupt.

And meals such as this one make good use of the abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables that come our way at this time of year.

I sliced three medium-sized onions, a chopped garlic clove and sliced a green bell pepper and sauteed them together in a little bit of olive oil until they were soft and slightly browned; grated peppercorns over, then allowed them to cool while I made a pie-crust dough of flour, salt, shortening and lemon-water. I roughly grated old cheddar, about a loose cup-full, and sliced six small tomatoes, and gathered fresh basil leaves from the garden.

Into the prepared pie shell went half of the grated cheese, topped with the onion-pepper combination, and over that a layer of tomato with the basil sprinkled over. Then came the second half of the grated cheese, and the top crust of the pie. The pie was baked until done, and served hot (and remains hot for quite some time) for dinner.

We had a small salad consisting of balled avocado along with sliced cucumber, baby carrots and cherry tomatoes harvested from the garden as an appetizer. The onion-tomato pie was followed by fresh sliced Ontario peaches for dessert.

Bountiful harvest!