This quesadilla, crisp-crusted and oozing cheese, celebrates one last summer harvest, boosting late-season vegetables with a little extra time on the stove and additional flavor from herbs and spices. This is hearty enough for a simple dinner and scales up easily for a crowd.

This is a late-summer harvest tossed with a hearty plateful of pasta and topped with lots of grated parmesan cheese. Vinegar and basil keep end-of-season produce tasting fresh and bright. One taste and you’ll be making this a lot earlier next year.

Classic Italian flavors — sweet summer tomatoes, bitter, salty capers and a bright red wine vinaigrette loaded with fresh basil and oregano — come together with Farfalle bowties for a quick, fresh and clean pasta salad ready for your next cookout. It might inspire your guests, like mine, to say this is the best pasta salad ever.

Creamy, baked zucchini and tomato are topped with runny, melted, fresh mozzarella. Surprising herbal notes from Za’atar, a North African blend of sesame seeds, sumac and herbs, will remind you of Italian seasoning but with something special and new. The simplicity of this dish belies layer upon layer of bright, rich summer flavor.

The tart side of sweet plums brings balance to this refreshing, easy tomato and fruit gazpacho. Floral coriander seed and the spiced notes of Thai basil lend it the complexity to serve as the opening act for steak off the grill, or play summer and light to a main course of poached fish.

This salad is so good it deserves hyperbole. Here goes. In the summertime, when the corn is high this simple salad celebrates tomatoes at their beautifully-balanced, sugary, acidic best. Sweet tomatoes, sharp, salty feta and the bright, earthy herb and red wine vinaigrette combine three big personalities on one stage and share the limelight in perfect balance delivering one delicious experience.

Zucchini and corn pancakes - think latkes - are sweet and savory, crisp on the outside and creamy inside. The refreshing cilantro crema perfectly balances the warm, summery flavors of the pancakes.

Sweet, fresh, crisp and piping hot - these corn and zucchini-filled, savory, summer vegetable “donuts” are made memorable with a pinch of curry powder. Are they an indulgence or eating your veggies? Who cares? They are a perfect small bite for a cookout or enjoy them as a meal with a large summer salad.

From summer through fall, my Mom’s arrival at our home is accompanied by food, harvested fresh from her garden and put up in her freezer. It always includes rich caponata, a classic Italian blend of eggplants and peppers, tomatoes, basil and capers. This dish captures those flavors in a quick, fresh, one-dish vegan homage to the end of summer.