Group of people sharing food at an outdoor table, with one person serving a plate while others sit around in a garden setting with string lights.

Eat Together: Summer Recipes for Gatherings

From the Sodexo Ireland & UK Culinary Team

Summer has always been about gathering

Summer has always been about gathering. The longer evenings, warm weather and smell of food cooking outdoors naturally draw people together, and there really is no better excuse to invite people over, slow down for a few hours and reconnect properly. 

For this guide, we collaborated with every member of the Sodexo Ireland culinary team and asked each chef to put their personality onto a plate. Rather than creating a collection of perfectly polished restaurant dishes, we wanted this book to reflect people, their food memories, cooking styles, favourite ingredients and the way they genuinely like to eat during summer. The result is a collection of dishes that feels personal, relaxed, colourful and built around sharing

Throughout the guide you’ll see global influences, bold flavours, lighter cooking styles, fire cooking, fresh herbs, grains, fermented foods, vibrant salads and dishes designed to be passed around a table. Some recipes are simple, others a little more adventurous, but all are intended to inspire.

We hope you use them as a starting point, put your own spin on them and adapt them to suit your own family, friends and style of cooking. More importantly, we hope this guide encourages people to gather together more often.

Eat Together: Summer Recipes for Gatherings

There is growing evidence showing that eating together has a positive effect on mental wellbeing. Shared meals help strengthen social connection, reduce feelings of isolation and create moments of genuine conversation in an increasingly distracted world.

Cover image with text “Eat Together: Summer Recipes for Gatherings” showing people dining outdoors while one person serves food across the table.

A taste of what's inside

Roasted beetroot hummus in a speckled ceramic bowl, drizzled with olive oil and garnished with fresh dill and paprika, served with breadsticks on a wooden board

Roasted Beetroot Hummus with Grissini Sticks

Serves: 6

Prep Time: 25 minutes

Cook Time: 1 hour 20 minutes

Ingredients:

  • 450g cooked beetroot
  • 4 tbsp tahini
  • 2 garlic cloves
  • 80ml lemon juice
  • 55g olive oil
  • 5g cumin
  • 6g salt
  • 3g sugar
  • 6g freshly ground black pepper
  • 200g strong bread flour
  • 6g fresh yeast or 3g dried yeast
  • 180ml water

Method:

Trim and wash the beetroot, then rub lightly with oil and roast at 200°C for approximately 1 hour until tender. Allow to cool slightly before rubbing away the skins. Add the roasted beetroot to a blender along with the tahini, garlic, lemon juice, olive oil, cumin, salt, sugar and black pepper. Blend until smooth, vibrant and creamy, adjusting seasoning if required.

For the grissini, combine the flour, yeast and water in a bowl and knead for approximately 5 minutes until smooth and elastic. Cover and allow the dough to rest for 20 minutes. Roll the dough out thinly on a lightly floured surface, cut into thin sticks and place onto a lined baking tray. Bake at 180°C for 15–20 minutes until golden and crisp.

Serve the roasted beetroot hummus alongside the warm grissini sticks for dipping.

Tip:

Roasting the beetroot rather than boiling helps concentrate the natural sweetness and gives the hummus a deeper earthy flavour.

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