Grilling Season

Unfortunately we're nearing the end of the grilling season in Montana, but we've grilled up a storm of tasty in the short time we've had warm enough weather to hang around outside while cooking.  We started the season off with a couple of variations on a real classic - the grilled burger.  We like to do lots of different things with burgers besides just changing the seasonings. For the burgers below we stuffed the center of the patties with various kinds of cheeses and peppers to essentially make them into "popper" burgers.

This one also has a full Anaheim pepper stuffed with cream cheese.  You can see the toothpicks we use to keep them together on the grill (remember to take them out before digging in!)  You could use this same basic idea with pretty much any type of pepper from jalapenos to green bell peppers.  Personally I like the Anaheim best as it's not too spicy and gets a slightly sweet flavor when the skin is blackened on the grill.

No grilling season can pass by without kebabs, and these are tons of fun just because of the sheer variety that is at your fingertips.  Below you can see the vegetable variety we went with, which includes mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, squash, broccoli, small potatoes, red onions, and a variety of bell peppers.

We also marinated chicken in a white wine and herb marinade for several hours, and then cut it up into square chunks to fit on the skewers.

Here you can see some of the finished products from the various times we've done kebabs this summer. Tomorrow night we're making another variety using sausages with fire roasted peppers and asiago cheese inside.

Corn on the cob done on the grill is a totally different experience from corn on the cob cooked in a pot of water, so we've taken advantage of the opportunity and had lots of corn over the last month.  For a little variety, we also cooked corn and then sliced it off the cob to throw on salads.

Hot dogs are an obvious grill food, but why do something so plain and simple?  For one grilling excursion a few weeks back we stuffed hot dogs with cheddar and then wrapped them in bacon.

Mixing up different styles, we made steak and vegetable fajitas cooked on the grill.  The strips of peppers and onions get a vastly different flavor blackening on the grill than they do being cooked on the stovetop.

One of our most recent grilled meals was a spur of the moment thing, as we found pork shoulder steaks on clearance while shopping the other day. The price couldn't be beat and we planned on making them that night so we wouldn't have to worry about the rapidly approaching expiration date.  The pork steaks were also marinated throughout the day so they were packed with flavor and didn't get dry.

To round out the meal we had Au Gratin potatoes and a nice big salad with nectarine, peach, apple, and an assortment of veggies.

Here's the aforementioned sausages, which we decided to try out before making them into kabobs by having them like hot dogs.  Rather than using the standards of onions, relish, or ketchup, we threw on chunky salsa and hot sauce.

These were incredibly fantastic sliders we had, but unfortunately we can't claim credit for their creation.  The butcher at the grocery store where we shop had these made for us, throwing in pieces of bacon and cheese. We topped them off with carmelized onions and mushrooms and put them on potato bread.  On the side are sweet potato fries.

We've still got a few more awesome grilling adventures to look forward to over the next week or two before it starts getting cold again, and then its on to fall cooking as we gear up for the fantastic Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas meals ahead!

Birthday Surf 'n Turf Burritos

It may have been snowing out, but you wouldn't have known that from the delicious fare we put together for my birthday a few months back.  It was all sun and smiles inside as we created a unique surf 'n turf style burrito inspired by the Surfin' California burrito at the Lucha Libre Taco Shop. 

To start off with, I cut up cilantro and added it to olive oil, allowing the flavors to marinate together for several hours.  The cilantro oil would get used later to cook the shrimp and add an extra burst of Mexican style flavor.

Since this wasn't meant to be a fork and knife affair, we also marinated the steak in Baja Citrus flavoring for a full day to ensure the meat would be tender enough to bite through easily in a burrito.  Below you can also see Megan slicing the marinated steak into thin strips with one of our sushi knives.

Here we're putting together the finished products with sour cream, diced tomato, steak strips, and shrimp.  Next was the ingredient that takes this to the next level - crispy french fries baked with spicy Cajun seasonings.  To finish off the burrito we spread on chipotle sauce and verde salsa.  The end result was simply fantastic, and easily among the best birthday dinners I've had the pleasure of enjoying.

The Hot Dog Sandwich

It's been quite a long while since we mentioned the War in Heaven chicken tacos, as one computer problem after another prevented the video from being prepared.  I am pleased to announce the video clip is finally being editing together today, and should hopefully be available shortly.

In the mean time, I thought I'd share an interesting creation I put together today.  We had a bunch of random things in the fridge that needed to be used, so I put together what I like to call the "Hot Dog Sandwich."  Rather than using a bun, I went with a sub roll so more goodies could be stuffed inside.

After laying on the hot dogs and bacon, I realized that melted cheese was, of course, an absolute necessity to achieve sandwich perfection.

Rather than use chili, I thought I'd take it a bit of a different route.  That wonderful pile of delicious you see below is actually Soyrizo, a soy version of the Mexican meat chorizo.  For anyone who isn't fond of meatless foods, let me assure that Soyrizo is actually one of the few that successfully mimics its meat counterpart, as it actually has the same texture and even better flavor than chorizo.

In homage to the hot dog roots of this sandwich, I threw some sauerkraut and relish on top of the hot dogs, bacon, and cheese layers.

I'm a pretty big fan of wing sauce, both on wings and other things like chicken sandwiches, and I frequently put it on my standard hot dogs, so it seemed prudent to douse the sandwich in a bit of the sauce as well.

To finish off this sandwich/hot dog behemoth I sprinkled on a bit of shredded lettuce for a little crispy bite and added texture.

Trying Out Whole Crab

Friday is easily the most glorious day of the week, and we like to commemorate the end of the work week by making something fun before the real weekend festivities begin. Lately I've been making several different taco variations, such as putting together my own take on the "Double Decker" taco - a hard shell taco inside a soft shell taco with a layer of beans holding them together.

Now that Friday has rolled around yet again I wanted to try something different. While doing our weekly shopping yesterday we strolled past the butcher block at Albertson's and saw that they have whole Dungeness crab for sale. They sell king crab legs nearly year round, but I'd never seen whole crab there before, which clinched our end-of-week meal. Here's the poor (and cute!) soul that would be gracing my table shortly.


Although they don't weigh that much, whole crabs are actually bigger than I expected. Even with his legs tucked in he still stretches across an entire plate.


I picked two accompaniments to go along with the crab: boiled potatoes and shrimp. For the potatoes, I boiled them at high heat along with garlic and whole peppercorns, which gives a much different flavor than just baking them (there's a fun recipe for boiled potatoes here). For the shrimp, I pulled off the tails and blanched them in the crab water for two minutes so they would be warm.

On to the crab itself, I popped it into a large pan of rapidly boiling water with a hefty helping of salt and pepper for a little flavor. You can find an informative article on how to handle crab at this location. After cooking for 10 minutes, the crab was dropped into an ice bath for a minute so it would be cool enough to handle, as crab is a very hands-on experience. Next, I pulled off the main shell and broke apart the legs for easier access to the succulent meat. Here's all of the meal put together, along with some melted butter for dipping:


Eating crab is actually a decent amount of work, but that's just part of the fun. I completely understand now why they give you bibs at crab restaurants, as by the end of the meal I had various crab parts just about everywhere. I'd definitely do whole crab again, and you may see it in future blogs in place of lobster or other seafood we usually have for special occasions. If crab ends up on the menu again in the future, there will be some more experimentation now that I've got the basics down, such as crab salad, crab tacos, or even crab sushi!

Thanksgiving

For food fanatics like us, Thanksgiving isn't so much a holiday as an event/food extravaganza. We look forward to this day all year long, and eagerly await the week's worth of turkey sandwiches afterward. After five years of Thanksgiving dinners together, we've got our family meal down pat, but this year we also branched out a bit and tried a few new things.

No one wants to spend all day putting together the meals and then doing dishes, so a significant amount of the prep-work actually gets done the day before. The green been casserole, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, and deviled eggs are assembled and refrigerated until the next day.

To start off with, Megan slices up the maple bacon for the green bean casserole, which is pan fried for a few minutes.



While we're throwing thin slices of bacon in the pan, the eggs for the deviled eggs are boiling and we're cooking up the cranberries, which will be refrigerated over night. Don't use that gross canned cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving - bagged cranberries aren't that expensive and don't take much effort to cook up.


After the bacon has cooked up a bit, it's tossed with a whole lot of green beans. We also picked up a few tin pans at the store so there would be fewer dishes. They also serve as an easy way to store the leftovers without having to use an extra tupperware dish.


Next up is the cream of mushroom soup to finish off the green bean casserole. At this stage it's oven-ready, so it waits in the fridge until the actual day of Thanksgiving.


Here's the peeled and cubed sweet potatoes getting a nice warm bath!


Thanksgiving isn't Thanksgiving without eating more deviled eggs than is really necessary. Weirdly, Matt doesn't like deviled eggs - which just means more for everyone else! This year we actually didn't make that many, as our friends Glen and Cristal make two delicious varieties and brought them over for dinner.


Here Megan is filling a cooked egg white with the devil egg filling, which uses mustard and the liquid from the olive jar.


Slices of olive and dashes of paprika finished off our deviled eggs for a nice presentation.


After boiling, the sweet potatoes cover a layer of marshmallows.


On top of that goes a generous layer of brown sugar.


And then finally there's butter and pecans added. Like the casserole, it's now oven ready, and is stowed away in the fridge for the night.


The morning of Thanksgiving (after getting the newspaper for the Black Friday ads!) we start the prep work for the turkey. Inspired by the show "Take Home Chef," we changed up our turkey spices this year and decided to do a butter rub. First off we finely diced whole garlic cloves and fresh sage.


Here's the finished pile of herbs and garlic, which smell simply fantastic, and really got our appetites up for the big event.

The herbs are mixed in to melted butter so the whole mixture can be rubbed in-between the skin and the meat of the turkey, which seasons the bird and gives the skin a different texture than normal.


Here the butter and herbs are thrown together just before getting mixed up.


The final product (while looking deceptively like spinach and artichoke dip somehow!) has an amazing aroma and gives the turkey a flavor that's to die for.


We got our biggest turkey ever this year, weighing in at a whopping 22 pounds. Albertson's ran a sale where the bird was 49 cents a pound if you bought another $25 worth of food. That was a no brainer for us, since we needed other Thanksgiving supplies anyway.


Megan and the guys really aren't fans of the neck, heart, liver, etc, but I like them as a change of pace from the standard turkey flavor, so we stuffed them inside the cavity to cook along with the bird.


Here's the turkey after applying the butter mixture. We pulled the skin up (Literally just pull up the edge of the skin with your finger, and then shove your hand under the skin and push back until the skin comes up from the meat. It's messy, but worth it.) and rubbed the mixture underneath, and then applied the leftovers to the top of the skin as well. For better cooking and to retain more moisture, the bird got hog tied with kitchen string.


Normally the turkey is our only meat dish on Thanksgiving, but this year we wanted to spice things up and have something fun to snack on while cooking, so I also got a big platter of shrimp and cocktail sauce.


To go to another level entirely, we also picked up a spiral ham at Sam's Club, which comes with a honey glaze. Here's the ham before applying the glaze.


Things are starting to come together and the oven time is about to begin. Here's the table with some veggie snacks and some of the dishes getting ready to hit the oven.


Glen made two different kinds of deviled eggs: chipotle bacon, and garlic with herb mayo. These most definitely are not your standard deviled eggs, and pack a huge flavor not usually found in this classic dish.


There has to be mashed potatoes, of course, and here's an unbelievable 10 pounds of them peeled, cubed, boiled, and waiting to be whipped up.


Stuffing is another tradition that we gleefully follow. In addition to the bread component, we saute various vegetables in butter before baking.


Just before putting the green been casserole and sweet potatoes in the oven, the casserole gets topped with french fried onions.


Here's the finished casserole, fresh out of the oven. By this point we were out of counter space, so our gaming table got put to good use.


Here I'm applying the honey glaze in-between each layer of the spiral sliced ham.


Gadzooks! The food is almost ready and Jacob is bamboozled by it's glory!


The ham comes out of the oven first, glazed and baked to perfection. Slices of spiral ham make an excellent sandwich the next day with miracle whip and cranberry mustard.

Here's the turkey coming out of the oven, which it turned out was a two-man job!


We use a cooking bag with the turkey, which seriously cuts down the cooking time and also keeps all the juices inside. Rather than using store bought gravy, we cut a hole in the bag and pour all the juice out into a pan.

Here's the juice from the turkey, which is already seasoned to perfection. Some flour and a little simmer time turns it into some of the best turkey gravy you'll ever have.


And here's some shots of the turkey about to get sliced. If you've ever wondered the best way to slice a turkey - it's actually really easy. Slide the knife into the center and cut down so you cut the bone in half. The turkey will naturally segment into two sides so you can easily cut off diagnal slices on either side.








That's a whole lot of turkey, and as you can imagine, it didn't all get eaten that night, even with friends over to help out. Plates of leftovers and turkey sandwiches are the order for the next few days. When we get tired of that, Megan uses what's left to make a big turkey pot pie.

Now that all the Thanksgiving festivities have calmed down and the leftovers are gone, we can get back to our normal weekly meals. We're going to be trying out some new meals using vegetables such as spaghetti squash and corn in the coming weeks, so check back soon for more delicious adventures in cooking!