
On a hot summer day the last thing you’ll want to do is eat hot food, but sometimes go-to foods like salads just aren’t enough and you’re craving something more. Here are just a few recipes to refreshingly switch things up during those steaming days.
Everyday food:
1. Shrimp spring rolls with Peanut Dipping sauce

Fresh spring rolls are one of the easiest types of Vietnamese food to recreate at home. It’s a healthy seafood and vegetable appetizer encased in a delicate translucent rice paper wrapper. These traditional Vietnamese spring rolls use a combination of crisp lettuce, shredded carrots, thinly sliced red cabbage and bean sprouts paired with shrimp. For an optional extra touch vermicelli rice noodles can be used to make each roll a little more hearty while still keeping it light. The trick is mastering how long to soak the spring roll wrappers, to make the rolling process a breeze. A sweet and savory sauce is a must have for these rolls. It’s a super simple blend of hoisin sauce, creamy peanut butter, and rice vinegar. The consistency is thick and luscious, perfect for dipping.
Total time: 35 minutes
Course: appetizer
Cuisine: Vietnamese
Servings : 10 rolls
Total cost of needed ingredients: $15 -$20
Recipe: Shrimp spring rolls with Peanut Dipping sauce
2. Philly Style Italian Hoagies

Easy Italian hoagies are the ultimate crowd-pleasing recipe. Deli meats, cheeses, hot cherry pepper spread, and veggies fill long rolls, and create the most delicious sub! A hoagie is a sandwich made on a long roll, traditionally filled with deli meats, cheeses, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and peppers. Some people prefer a dry sub while others like mayo, olive oil, cherry pepper spread, or vinegar. The thing that’s so great about this recipe is that you can adapt the ingredients to suit your taste buds! You can use one variety of deli meat, or you can use a few different ones that fit your liking.
Total time: 10 Minutes
Course: Dinner
Cuisine: Italian
Servings: 6 servings
Total cost: $10 – $15
Recipe: Philly Style Italian Hoagies
3. BBQ Chicken Pizza

Made entirely on the grill, this recipe has summer crisp corn, BBQ sauce, ranch dressing and tons of herbs. Finnish it off with some pickled onions and it’ll be the tastiest thing you’ll ever try. This summer grilled pizza calls for a stacking of charred chicken in BBQ sauce, corn off the cob, crisp green onions and chives, lots of cheese! – cheddar, mozzarella, and parmesan, fresh chives, pickled onions and all the herbs. Lastly, you can’t forget the ranch dressing for drizzling all over. Grilling the entire pizza will give you a charred and smoky flavor that’s just wonderful. The corn is what makes the pizza really special. It adds a bit of sweetness to give it that delicious sweet and savory flavor. It adds a crisp little crunch from the kernels for that extra touch of texture. The cherry on top has to be its chewy and flavorful dough. This pizza is so satisfying with incredible texture and flavors that complement each other so well.
Total time: 2 Hours 15 Minutes
Course: Dinner
Cuisine: American
Servings: 4 people
Total cost: $15 – $20
Recipe: BBQ Chicken Pizza
Fun snacks:
1. Fruit Pizza

This colorful fruit pizza features a vibrant bounty of fruit atop a soft sugar cookie crust and thick, tangy cream cheese frosting. You can choose all your favorite fruits to customize this classic summertime dessert! This recipe is completely from scratch but easy and fun to make. Great for kids to help out and endlessly customizable with various fruits + berries, making it visually stunning without the need for any special decorating tools or skills. The sugar cookie crust is only 8 ingredients with a frost crust in the center and a slightly crisp edge. It’s like a thicker, larger version of classic sugar cookies. The cream cheese frosting for the pizza “sauce” is smooth, creamy and spreads with ease. The combination of a soft, buttery sugar cookie crust with tangy-sweet cream cheese frosting and colorful fresh fruit is nostalgic and irresistible!
Total time: 2 hours
Course: Dessert
Servings: 10 – 12
Total cost: $10 – $20
Recipe: Fruit Pizza
2. Apple Pie

A mountain of gooey cinnamon apples nestled under a perfectly buttery and flakey pie crust is the most perfect dessert for a windy summer day. This recipe is a classic without any complicated ingredients needed. The golden flakey double pie crust provides a crisp contrast to the soft and juicy cinnamon-spiced filling. The secret ingredient of this apple pie is a touch of lemon. Just a tiny splash of lemon will prevent the apples from browning and keep its flavor bright. Tall slices with oodles of tender apples won’t be overly mushy, allowing you to get the full experience of a comforting filled flavor.
Total time: 7 hours (including cooling)
Course: dessert
Servings: 8 – 10
Total cost: $10 – $15
Recipe: Apple Pie
3. Chocobananas

Chocobananos are frozen bananas covered in chocolate and sprinkled with toppings. They have a decadent taste of banana ice cream and the beneficial ingredients of bananas. They are a great pre-dinner snack and an even better dessert when covered in chocolate. This super easy snack is not only refreshing but so easy, only needing two ingredients, bananas and chocolate! Any kind of chocolate can be used but it is most delicious with milk chocolate, offering a sweet and creamy taste. If you’re looking for something unique try white chocolate! It still offers that sweet and creamy flavor but compliments the banana’s natural sweetness as well. This childhood snack will have you feeling so refreshed on a hot sunny day.
Total time: 10 minutes (including cooling)
Course: dessert/snack
Servings: 4
Total cost: $2 -$4
Recipe: Chocobananas
Conclusion:
There’s so much more where that came from! These are only just a few of a thousand summer recipes out there. Websites such as Taste of Home and Good Food all have so many unique and tasty recipes to try out in case my given examples weren’t to your personal taste. Try something new, cook up your family a delicious cold lunch or a refreshing dessert for this summer!
Works Cited:
Gavin, J. (2023, December 31). Shrimp spring rolls with peanut dipping sauce. Jessica Gavin. https://www.jessicagavin.com/fresh-shrimp-spring-rolls-with-peanut-dipping-sauce/
Szewczyk, J. (2019, February 3). 16 cool and refreshing recipes to make when it’s too hot outside. tasty.co. https://tasty.co/article/jesseszewczyk/cold-dinners-that-arent-salad
Manila, A. (2025, January 28). The best italian hoagies (ready in 5 minutes!) – baker by nature. Baker by Nature – A Baking Blog by Ashley Manila. https://bakerbynature.com/best-philly-style-italian-hoagies/
McKenney, S. (2023, October 5). My favorite apple pie recipe (video). Sally’s Baking Addiction. https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/apple-pie-recipe/#tasty-recipes-67756