Greek Yogurt Chicken Skewers
Greek Chicken Kabobs This is one of my favorite meals. The great thing about it is that you can do all the dinner prep hours…or a day before. And then just cook it in about 12 minutes on the grill and look like you are a culinary genius. 1 cup whole milk Greek yogurt 4 garlic cloves, I used jarred minced 1 tsp. paprika 1 tsp. ground cumin 1/2 cup sweet onion, grated with a box-grater Zest from 1 lemon 2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice 2 Tbsp. olive oil 1/2 cup chopped cilantro 2 tsp. kosher salt 1/2 tsp. black pepper 2 lbs. boneless, skinless, chicken thighs, cut into strips Mix it up, put in the chicken and coat. Let rest a couple hour or overnight. Put on skewers and grill about 5 minutes each side on a medium high heat. As you can see in the photo, I like some...
Pulled Pork Tacos
Memorial Day Pulled Pork Week ends tonight with pulled pork tacos. This is completely leftovers from the week. I had the street taco tortillas, Green Mountain Salsa and my fine Mexican shredded cheese from my taquitos earlier this week, onions and green peppers from my pork egg rolls and my usual box of salad I always keep on hand. I also had some left over saffron rice from my stuffed poblano dinner, so I added a heaping tablespoon of that. I didn’t have any sour cream or yogurt, so I tried something new, a thin line of mayonnaise to be my ‘cool cream’. Not much. It worked great. As I am wont to do, I brushed the tortillas with a butter/garlic powder mix and baked them at 400° for about 6 minutes to get them nice, puffy and crisp. I lay them...
Pork Egg Rolls
While I have written up my egg rolls before (chicken) I didn’t think I did it justice. So tonight I cooked up a batch of pork egg rolls, as I had a HUGE PILE of pulled pork from Memorial Day (9 pounds of pork at 99 cents a pound…less than 10 dollars of pork that I could live a month off of). Chop up a couple cups of cabbage slaw. Fine chop the pork, dice up some green onion. Make some teriyaki. Heat olive oil to medium high, add diced onion, then ginger, then garlic and saute, add Mirin and Soy sauce to taste, cook down. Add a couple tablespoons to the slaw/onion/pork mix and toss. Place down egg roll wrapper, brush edges with water, put in a heaping tablespoon of the mix. Fold. Fold edges. Roll tightly. Melt some butter with some garlic powder, brush...
Salmon Melts
When life hands you salmon…make salmon melts. I had a nice dinner with friends Saturday night, my classic 5-thing-salmon on a bed of feta/basil pasta with peas. But I bought two fillets of Salmon, and I only needed one. So tonight I decided on a Salmon melt for dinner. I already had all the ingredients. I had hoped on smoked up some pork for a pulled pork meal, but the boston butt showed up too late at the store. So this was my plan B, and it’s a great plan B. Normally I make a tuna melt with this recipe, but Salmon works great two, and as noted, I had a fillet that was already marinated with my 5-thing marinade. So, broil the salmon for about 5 minutes. Make a Tapenade. I had a fun shortcut here. Since I always have garlic stuffed queen olives, I...
Pork Ribs
Ribs again? Yes. Last week I stumbled on a rack of beef ribs, which was rare. And they were great. But beef ribs are a little shy of that satisfying bite. Great flavor, yes, but not a lot of meat. I will note that I took two of them, shaved the meat and made a killer beef rib mac-and-cheese that lasted several lunches. But it did leave me with a hankering for a good rib. So for this Sunday’s dinner I did my classic St. Louis Rib. I looked through my previous recipes, and it didn’t show up (I will share my recipe blog soon). This is my non-smoker recipe on a gas grill. STEP ONE The rub. I mix powder, garlic powder, paprika, cumin, sea salt (very little to almost none), black pepper, dried basil and cayenne pepper to taste. For ribs I like cumin, but my...
Don’s Classic Pizza
While I have written up various pizzas in the past, I wanted to get down my classic pizza, and more importantly, my home-made sauce. To make the sauce I saute a small amount (1/4 cup?) of minced sweet onion in a splash of olive oil inside a sauce pan. I toss in a heaping tablespoon of minced garlic right before the onion caramelizes and cook it through briefly, it’s important to not let the garlic burn. Then I toss in about half a cup of lean 90/10 ground chuck. Break up the meat and cook till crispy brown. Blot off any grease if there is any. Pour in one 16 oz can of Tomato sauce, if you have a no-salt added can, even better. Toss in a bay leaf. Stir in a handful of fresh oregano if available. If not, 2 tablespoons of dry is good. Add basil and parsley to...