HOT Dinners!

Heat wave here, and across much of the country, this week. What are you making for dinner to beat the heat?

Tonight, we are having chicken salad, tomato, mozzarella & basil salad, green salad and watermelon. Tomorrow my kids have a 1/2 day because of the predicted temps and no AC in the schools -- it may well be ice pops for dinner then!

Kathy's Baked Beans

1/2 pound bacon, browned and crumpled
1 medium onion, chopped and browned in bacon fat
2 large cans of B&M Baked Beans
1 can Kidney beans (I sometimes also add a can of Garbanzo beans)
1 can Butter beans

After browning bacon and onion add to crockpot along with the cans of beans. Add in 1/2 C ketchup, 1/2 C molasses and 1 t powdered mustard (I use Coleman's). The orginal recipe also calls for 1/2 pound of ground beef of turkey. (I have never used this as I always serve meat alongside the beans). Heat in Crockpot about 4 hours on low.

What's for Dinner this week?

We have a busy week (if 1/2 of our activities aren't rained out). I'm feeling spent on creativity and am wondering what wonderful meals you are all having this week? Please share!

Spinach grapefruit salad

Salad:

1/2 c. red onion, sliked thin in vertical strips

1 large pink or white grapefruit

6 c. spinach leaves

1 large avocado, peeed, pitted and cut into 12 wedges

1 T. pine nuts or pomengranate seeds for garnish

Dressing:

3 T. fresh lemon juice

3 T. honey

1/2 t. coarse salt

freshly ground pepper

Kelly made this for Easter. It was great. Very springy and the flavor mix was great. She was kind enough to share the recipe so wanted to pass it on. It's on the menu tonight.

I was planning to do a leg of lamb on Sunday, but the Frenched rack of lamb (“lamb lollipops”) looked so great, that I couldn’t pass them up.



As I was shopping, I ran into a friend who had picked up the lamb chops too, and she was asking how I planned to cook them. Thought it might be beneficial to share the most basic of recipes for grilled lamb chops. This is another one of those dishes where the simplicity of it really does make the dish.

Rosemary grilled lamb chops

8 4-oz lamb chops, Frenched
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 t minced garlic
1 T finely chopped rosemary leaves
1 lemon, halved
1 t kosher salt
½ t freshly ground black pepper

Preheat grill. Rub chops with oil, garlic, rosemary, lemon, salt, and pepper, and let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Place chops on the grill and cook for 4-6 minutes on each side (chops will be medium-rare). (Alternatively, chops could be broiled, about 6 inches from heat, for the same amount of time.) Place chops on a plate and cover with foil for about 5 minutes.

Serve with mint jelly or bourbon-mint sauce for an Irish finish, or with cucumber-yogurt sauce for a Greek or Middle Eastern finish. We might just serve both as a nod to our families’ combined ethnicities.

Bourbon-mint sauce

½ c sugar
¼ c white wine vinegar
2 T Bourbon whiskey
1 c fresh mint, minced

Dissolve sugar into vinegar. Mix in bourbon and mint. Serve immediately, or store in a container in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

Cucumber-yogurt sauce

2 c yogurt
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded, chopped
1 shallot, minced
juice of ½ lemon
1 T fresh parsley, finely chopped
1 T fresh mint, finely chopped
1 large pinch salt
ground white pepper, to taste

In a bowl, combine all ingredients. Serve immediately, or store in a container in the refrigerator until ready to serve, as a salad dressing or as an accompaniment with Greek, Middle Eastern, or Indian foods, especially spicy foods.

Here’s another item to file under: Necessity is the mother of invention. I wanted to bring scones to a morning meeting, but I was out of eggs, and I didn’t want to run to the grocery store. I googled “breakfast, no eggs” and the first recipe that came up was epicurious.com’s Bacon and date scones.

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I was a little nervous they’d be a little dry without the additional liquid from the eggs, but they were the perfect recipe for the day. I had all the ingredients. As a bonus, it had the sweet-and-savory combination that I love, like cranberry-spinach salad, strawberry-spinach salad with blue cheese, brie en croute with any number of sweet insides (another blog at another time), sweet hot chicken with snow peas, sweet hot shrimp with broccoli, sweet hot tofu, and last, but not least, roasted sausage and grapes with garlic mashed potatoes (also another blog at another time).

Savory bacon and dates scones
adapted from epicurious.com

10 ozs thick-cut bacon slices
2 c all purpose flour
¼ c sugar
1 t vanilla
1½ t baking powder
¾ t baking soda
½ t coarse kosher salt
¾ c coarsely chopped pitted dates
½ c (1 stick) chilled butter
2/3 c buttermilk*

Preheat oven to 400°. Line baking sheet with parchment paper. Cook bacon using your preferred method (I prefer in the oven, it cooks evenly, and unattended) until cooked through, but still tender and not crisp, turning occasionally. Transfer bacon to paper towels to drain; cool. Pour bacon drippings from skillet into small heatproof bowl and reserve.

Using one hand, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in large bowl. Coarsely chop cooled bacon. Add bacon and dates to flour mixture; toss to coat. Coarsely grate butter into flour mixture. Again using one hand, stir in butter and buttermilk until large moist clumps form. Continue to combine mixture until all dry ingredients are incorporated and a soft dough forms. (Scones can be made to this point and refrigerated overnight to bake in the morning for warm scones at breakfast.)

Transfer dough to parchment paper. Pat into 8-inch round. Cut into 8 wedges. Pull scones apart. Brush with reserved bacon drippings. Bake scones until golden brown, 16 to 18 minutes. Serve warm.

*If you do not have buttermilk available, you can combine 2/3 c milk and 2/3 T white vinegar and let stand for 10 minutes.

St. Patrick's Day Food

We had a few friends over last night to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. We were having drinks, "heavy appetizers" and desserts. My serving goal was to serve foods that were Irish-inspired and/or orange and green. I am putting up my menu (before I forget):

Lamb Chops with Yogurt Mint Sauce

Corned Beef & Cabbage Slaw Sliders

Roasted New Potatoes with Horseradish Cream and Smoked Salmon

Cockles & Mussels (sauteed a little garlic in butter, added white wine and parsley and steamed the mussels and cockles)

Green, White & Orange Veggies with spinach dip

Irish Soda Bread

Car Bomb Cupcakes

Minted Peaches with Mint Ice Cream (I tossed sliced fresh peaches with some sugar and chopped mint. I mixed some chopped fresh mint into softened vanilla ice cream and served in a martini glass on top of the peaches)

And my friend Maria brought Mint Brownies (she makes her brownies, then while they are still hot she puts Andes Candies on top and spreads them as they melt. Beautiful and delicious!)

We had Guinness, Harp, Bass and others, and of course, finished with Irish Cream.

Overall, exactly the meal I was hoping for. I don't think I would omit or change one thing.