Christmas in June cookout! 6/29/19

Posted on June 30, 2019 by Beebamom

Since we were off in Italy over Christmas with our adult children, we never had a chance to celebrate with the grandkids. We had this situation arise once before and found that having Christmas around the Summer Solstice was an excellent time to get the family together for some presents and a cookout!

In keeping with the theme I put our Christmas wreath on the door and decorated the back patio a bit and of course had a tree representation with presents nearby.

Christmas decorations

Presents and a faux tree

Once the present opening was done we started in on the Christmas cookout food – hamburgers, bratwurst, a big summer fruit salad, potato salad, and roasted golden beets and blood orange slices with arugula and feta cheese. Later we had some ice cream with our daughter’s intensely strawberry sauce made from wild strawberries in her garden.

Bratwurst and sauerkraut, potatoes salad, good oranges and golden beets

If it were up to me I think the end of June is a fine time for Christmas. The weather is great and the kids haven’t had a bunch of presents for 6 months!

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Chicken thighs, potato salad, cole slaw

Posted on June 29, 2019 by Beebamom

Chicken thighs, potato sauce, cole slaw

In case you are thinking I went to the grocery store and just bought all this stuff, I did not. We made everything from scratch and it really came together pretty fast. John cooked the chicken in the oven and at the end crisped it under the broiler. I put BBQ sauce on mine afterward.

My part was to make the potato salad and cole slaw. Since I am making German potato salad for our family cookout on Saturday I wanted to see if I could make it with russet potatoes instead since I like them better. The answer is no. They turn into mashed potatoes with a minimum of manipulation. Good to know. Back to the store for small red potatoes!

I used my little mandoline to shred the cabbage, onion, and partially the carrot for the cole slaw. It is a traditional mayo based slaw. I also used Dijon mustard in it and I think I will change that to yellow mustard. The Dijon is a little too strong. Best advice I can give is to keep tasting your creations as you are making them to make them taste best!

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Shrimp cocktail and a salad. 6/27/19

Posted on June 28, 2019 by Beebamom

Tonight we made another hot weather dinner. Unfortunately it was so chilly out that we had to close the back door! I am definitely not complaining about the weather though.  I know pretty soon it will be blazing hot again.

This is dead simple. John poached the shrimp by making up a tasty broth (court buillion) consisting of salt, lemon juice and zest, Old Bay, onion, and peppercorns in a pot of water. Heat to boiling and let it cook together for a few minutes. Turn off the heat and after a minute or two of cool down, add the shrimp, cover, and let them sit for 10 minutes. Drain and refrigerate the shrimp. Fix a cocktail sauce of ketchup, lemon, and horseradish.

Shrimp cocktail – Old School fancy!!

For my part, I had the onerous task of making a salad. I still do not like doing it but we have had so many salads lately that I am getting used to it. My salad consisted of Romaine lettuce, tomatoes, snow peas, radishes, scallions, julienned turkey pastrami, cucumbers, and feta cheese. It is dressed with a vinaigrette and I added garlic rubbed croutons. But you make yours the way you like best!

Pretty composed salad

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Always in the top ten meals at our house. 6/26/19

Posted on June 27, 2019 by Beebamom

What is my favorite thing to make and eat? It might be eggplant parmesan or maybe fried scallops. I really liked the gazpacho and avocado toast I made last week. But for ease of preparation and comfort whole wheat spaghetti with a ground beef ragu is near the top. The last time I made the sauce I made a large batch and froze four containers of it. So last night’s meal prep consisted of defrosting and heating up the sauce and boiling water for the pasta.

No doubt it is possible to screw this up. You could forget to salt the pasta water or overcook the spaghetti. Luckily none of that happened last night. And it was so good!

Whole wheat spaghetti with ground beef and tomato ragu

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Oops.

Posted on June 26, 2019 by Beebamom

Did the links incorrectly on my previous post so they are not working. In any case the two dinners I referred to are Chilling and Grilling  and Clam Chowder on Toast.

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More vegan summer fare. 6/25/19

Posted on June 26, 2019 by Beebamom

I am a little late getting this posted today. My daughter and I spent the morning and early afternoon buying supplies for our Summer Solstice (Christmas in June) celebration.

On Tuesday we had such a tasty summer vegan meal. I had some vegetables left over from clam chowder on toast night and the lamb chop and tabbouleh dinner and turned the potato, leek, and parsley into a green vichyssoise (that’s cold potato and leek soup with parsley.) I cooked the three ingredients in some olive oil and vegetable stock and liquified the results in the blender. After some chill time in the refrigerator it was ready for dinner garnished with our “good” olive oil and some basil.

Cold potato, leek, and parsley soup

With our soup we had crostini fresh from the garden. I topped our toasts with my first tomato from my Early Girl tomato plant and some of my daughter’s golden cherry tomatoes from her plot at the Community Garden. In addition the basil was from the pot I have sitting on our patio.  The onions were from the grocery store along with the garlic that I rubbed on the toast. A drizzle of olive oil, some salt and it was perfect.

Summer crostini

I am really enjoying making these cold summer soups. I will definitely have to find a new one for next week!

 

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Southwest salad and a chipotle bean burger. 6/24/19

Posted on June 25, 2019 by Beebamom

We eat our dinner in two courses tonight starting with a vibrant summer-y Southwest salad. I charred some corn kernels and macerated them along with a small dice of onion and cumin in lime juice and olive oil. This would be my dressing over a composed plate of Romaine, avocado, mint, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, and radishes – beautiful and tasty!

Summer Southwest salad

John cooked up some frozen Morningstar Chipotle Bean Burgers first by a quick microwaving and then a sear in a hot skillet to give the exterior a little crunch. John eats his with some onion and BBQ sauce while I go the California burger route with ketchup and onion on one side and mayo, lettuce, and tomato on the other.

California style chipotle bean burger

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Weekly menu

Posted on June 23, 2019 by Beebamom

I see that my views are falling off when I cook something that is not vegan or vegetarian.  I want to make more veg dishes but I do have to cater to both John and my dinner desires. This week I have three vegan or vegetarian dishes, one seafood, one chicken, and two meat dishes. In one of the meat dishes, spaghetti with beef ragu, the meat is a bit player. 
*We are having our Christmas, 2018 celebration in June because we were away at Christmas. It’s been a while since the kids have had presents so having summer Christmas is exciting to them.

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Leftovers – Curried rice with chicken and carrots

Posted on June 23, 2019 by Beebamom

The chicken that I bought at Costco is the focus of Saturday’s debate about what to eat for dinner. We still have half of it left. I am not feeling like chicken salad. John is not feeling like chicken with pasta and peanut sauce. We decide on our version of curry.

John sautes the spices while I cut up the onions, garlic, and carrots. In his mix he has some cayenne pepper and fresh ginger for some spiciness as well as curry powder. He adds the rice, carrots, and some raisins for sweetness. I shred up all the chicken dark meat along with part of the white meat. (Curses! We still have left over chicken!) In the last few minutes of cooking we add the chicken and have it warm through.

Okay, dinner is fine but I am chickened out and there is still a bunch left. Now the question is – what are we going to do with the rest of the chicken!? On Sunday I think we will have to have a his and hers dinner. Maybe chicken quesadillas for John and something vegetarian for me. We’ll see.

Curried rice with chicken, raisins, and carrots

Costco rotisserie chicken may be a great buy. But it is too much chicken for the two of us!

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Grilling and chilling

Posted on June 22, 2019 by Beebamom

Here in Northern California our weather runs in 3 to 4 day cycles. We will have a few days of glorious weather with highs in the upper 70’s and lows in the upper 50’s and then a heating trend where for 3 or 4 days the highs are in the 90s to 100F with lows in the 60s. Even when it is hot the humidity is low so it is not terribly uncomfortable but I like to keep the house as cool as possible to cut down on the air conditioning. Thus, we had a dinner of grilling and chilling.

The grilling refers to the lamb chops which were sous vide and then grilled outside and the sweet potato which was microwaved and then also grilled. Except for the hot water from the immersion circulator (132.5F) everything stayed pretty cool. For the chilling portion of dinner instead of making a cooked vegetable I opted for a very lemony, minty tabbouleh which paired nicely with the lamb.

Grilled lamb chop with grilled sweet potato and tabbouleh

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