Another lazy holiday weekend evening. Friends for a barbeque.As always I thought I'd be home sooner, but as I dashed in the door at 5 PM with friends coming at 5:30 and no appetizer planned I dashed for the pantry and lo and behold two jars of ready to eat treats just waiting for crackers or crostini. Last fall when our garden was spilling over I canned up jars of "hot" (not really too hot) peppers and "pickled eggplant". For just such an occasion. I tried not to look too proud when our friends noticed the custom labels. Add some crackers, cheese, olives and a couple slices of salami an there was plenty to munch on while we got down to the work of what I'm calling "audience participation dinner."
While I was in santa Fe I bought a bag of blue corn flour, thinking I would give it as a gift. I never did so today seemed like a good time to use it up with a batch of homemade warm tortillas. I poured enough boiling water into the flour to make a thick, but not sticky dough. Eric rolled the dough into balls, Shari flattened them and I laid them on the waiting heating iron pans to cook through. Not the prettiest tortillas I've ever seen -- none of us will be mistaken for Jane Russell in "The Outlaw" but they were warm and chewy and all together not too bad for a first attempt. I started thinking about tortillas because, having a stock of chickens in the freezer from our poultry CSA, I had zeroed in on a grilled chicken recipe from Rick Bayless that coats the flattened (spatchcocked actually) birds with a mixture of chili powder, orange juice, oregano, cinnamon, clove, and apple cider vinegar before grilling them over indirect heat for 45 minutes. In the last 10 minutes I added some lightly oiled and salted green onions to the flaming side of the grill. Bayless serves his chicken with a tomatillo salsa. We had fresh avocados, which James loves, so I whipped up a quick guacamole with chopped onion, cilantro, jalapeno peppers, and lime juice.
More homegrown showing off. These lima beans and wax beans are from our garden. I blanched the beans until tender, added some thinly sliced red onions (also from our garden) and dressed the mixture in red wine vinegar, sherry vinegar (2 TB each) and about 1/4 cup of roasted walnut oil. Salt pepper and a handful of chopped fresh mint finished off this easy summer salad.
Speaking of salad. Since the grill was going I decided to give a grilled romaine salad a try. I brushed the quartered heads with olive oil and salt and tinged the leaves with the flames for about 20 seconds on a side. A feta cheese vinaigrette (3 oz feta cheese, 5 TB olive oil, 1 tsp oregano, 1 TB water, 2 1/2 TB red wine vinegar all whirled in the blender until creamy, it's a food and Wine recipe) along with oven roasted cherry tomatoes I had made earlier in the day. My favorite dish of the night. My favorite dish for quite some time.
Dessert? Well it was sort of a barbeque. I blended up a quart of blueberries, lime juice and some simple syrup and poured it into popsicle molds. Done.
While I was in santa Fe I bought a bag of blue corn flour, thinking I would give it as a gift. I never did so today seemed like a good time to use it up with a batch of homemade warm tortillas. I poured enough boiling water into the flour to make a thick, but not sticky dough. Eric rolled the dough into balls, Shari flattened them and I laid them on the waiting heating iron pans to cook through. Not the prettiest tortillas I've ever seen -- none of us will be mistaken for Jane Russell in "The Outlaw" but they were warm and chewy and all together not too bad for a first attempt. I started thinking about tortillas because, having a stock of chickens in the freezer from our poultry CSA, I had zeroed in on a grilled chicken recipe from Rick Bayless that coats the flattened (spatchcocked actually) birds with a mixture of chili powder, orange juice, oregano, cinnamon, clove, and apple cider vinegar before grilling them over indirect heat for 45 minutes. In the last 10 minutes I added some lightly oiled and salted green onions to the flaming side of the grill. Bayless serves his chicken with a tomatillo salsa. We had fresh avocados, which James loves, so I whipped up a quick guacamole with chopped onion, cilantro, jalapeno peppers, and lime juice.
More homegrown showing off. These lima beans and wax beans are from our garden. I blanched the beans until tender, added some thinly sliced red onions (also from our garden) and dressed the mixture in red wine vinegar, sherry vinegar (2 TB each) and about 1/4 cup of roasted walnut oil. Salt pepper and a handful of chopped fresh mint finished off this easy summer salad.
Speaking of salad. Since the grill was going I decided to give a grilled romaine salad a try. I brushed the quartered heads with olive oil and salt and tinged the leaves with the flames for about 20 seconds on a side. A feta cheese vinaigrette (3 oz feta cheese, 5 TB olive oil, 1 tsp oregano, 1 TB water, 2 1/2 TB red wine vinegar all whirled in the blender until creamy, it's a food and Wine recipe) along with oven roasted cherry tomatoes I had made earlier in the day. My favorite dish of the night. My favorite dish for quite some time.
Dessert? Well it was sort of a barbeque. I blended up a quart of blueberries, lime juice and some simple syrup and poured it into popsicle molds. Done.
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Love the labels! How did you do those? Are they custom printed? We have a few canned things we'd like to give to people, and custom labels would be awesome... I'll be trying out that roasted romaine next weekend - looks delicious.
ReplyDeleteah easy -- my secret label source
ReplyDeletemyownlabels.com
we do them for everything!