It’s Summahtime - at least for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere. Grill season in full swing - for those of us (not me!) to be able to grill. So what’s cooking? Or grilling? Or smoking?
And to tie in with the grilling comment, it’s also the DOTM for June:
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First meal of June! Just a simple BBQ.
French steaks, “Bavette” cut/“flank steak”.
Almost ready.
Dindin in the garden.
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how did u manage to sear it that brown and still be not overcooked?
I am very particular with my sea scallops, only buying the ones that are not treated with STP ( dry as opposed to wet) ones
leaving them in the fridge uncovered overnight,
However, I can never get them that brown and crusty outside while still having a tender springy center
I sere them with butter and olive oil with my cast iron skillet.
i read not to use butter but clarified butter or just vegetable oil
Is that the trick? or any other trick up your sleeves?
Thanks
“Not my dinner”
DH sent me this picture … he proudly titled it
“cast iron cooking”… boys! If not for the supermarket pierogies … SMH
Hard to believe that the store linked below is within reasonable driving distance
from our home … he will be retrained when I finally get out there
http://www.polskismaknj.com/
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Dry brine was salt, sugar and a little baking soda to raise pH. Enhances browning
Drying in the fridge for a couple hours helped as well
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thanks
I found baking soda on chicken wings overnight also makes it crispier when oven fried.
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No cooking here. I’m in Seoul on a crazy nonstop work trip.
Our first night we got in late and i ordered room service, a surprisingly fantastic grilled vegetable sandwich on hazelnut whole grain bread with greens that taste like the best arugala ever.
The next night i was the only vegetarian of the group so we ended up at korean bbq place- the smells bothered me a lot so i only had some banchan veggies with rice, the tofu dish came in a fish soup or other dishes with meat.
Tonight my fellow vegetarian coworker and i went on a walk to find something for dinner and discovered many little restaurants that all had a specialty- like beef or chicken or (who knew??) this spot with an english menu and specialty of octopus…! I had to snap a quick photo.
Down yet another little alley street
we finally settled for a little take and go style shop with salads. Totally lame bowl of greens with a few nuts.
EPIC fail !!! We settled for drinks at the lobby bar when we got back.
I’m so disappointed but we have already asked the concierge to help us find a good dinner restaurant for tomorrow night since we fly to Shanghai the following morning. Hoping to get some actual sleeping tonight since we have another busy nonstop day tomorrow
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I’m badly in need of a trip to the grocery store, so last night was a thrown-together one-skillet meal that wasn’t half bad. I bought some chicken sausages at Costco that neither of us really cared for, but I thought I could disguise them with enough garlic, so I browned them, sliced them and added them to a sauteed mixture of shallots, mushrooms, roasted cherry tomatoes and a copious amount of garlic, thyme and parsley. Loaded it with grated parmesan and it was at least edible. DH didn’t get home until almost 10pm so he was hungry enough to eat just about anything at that point anyway!
This weekend I plan to stock up on grillable meats, vegetables and lump charcoal - we will be cooking with fire!!!
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No time and no idea how to make it look nice® today. Besides, I’m being miserable from my sun allergy and it’s a long weekend here. No doctor to get prescription and no pharmacy is open til next tuesday.
Sous vide rhubarb and tuna steak. It’s a massive steak. We liked the SV rhubarb a lot.
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A SUN allergy? Ohhhh, Presunto - this stinks! But the tuna steak looks wonderful!
One of those “longest short weeks” evah. I hate these weeks.
And my good intentions of having sangria and tapas tonight were all for naught. Two hellacious work days meant a small tub of chili was pulled from the downstairs freezer when I finally got home, defrosted and heated, and served on top of some elbow noodles.
Aged Manchego cheese grated on top with a healthy (a wicked healthy!) dollop of sour cream.
Oh yeah. There’s wine. And possibly an after dinner drink. Or ice cream. Or both.
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Tonight’s dinner was Moo gu gai pan. Recipe was tasty and I threw in some egg tofu in addition to the chicken. Served with some steamed green beans tossed in black bean garlic sauce. I love that my 3.5 year old picks the mushrooms out and eats them!
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Wine , an after dinner drink and ice cream sound exactly right to me…!! Great that you have some freezer chili on hand , looks fantastic
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Well, whew. Food luck turned around in a major way. I found great juice at a silly coffee shop of all places- the kiwi one is called “juice” but it’s really just kiwi put in a blender- and generally the fruit is wonderfully fresh and ripe here
The afternoon convenience store coffee selection is impressive and oh so necessary
And then early evening hotel room working happy hour convenience store “blooming” wine - which turned out to be a lovely slightly sweet one kinda like a rose
Lunch was randomness between work appointments but then we met with local work associates and it was like the food gods finally smiled on us…! They brought us to a traditional korean restaurant, their favorite. Low table, no shoes, and certainly no english anywhere. They were dismayed i am vegetarian and ordered a special tofu dish you can see part of in this photo- and next to the slabs of the best tofu i have ever had (so fresh, they make it there and it had some sesame oil and seeds on it) was a pile of crazy kimchi that was mixed with beef slices!
glad my coworker gave me a heads up on that… from what they explained aside from the great banchan there was a mul kimchi, sesame leaves/tofu/greens/apple salad, a platter of grilled thick bacon with fresh kimchi and cabbage to wrap up together, little oyster pancakes, sesame leaves stuffed with beef and then fried in egg batter, a tofu soondobu stew that the egg landed in (also “vegetarian” yet with clams in the bottom…! Ha!!), bowls of mixed grains rice, a beef dish of somesort on a sizzling platter and we drank some wonderful cloudy effervescent rice wine that i loved and promptly forgot the name of. Anyhow, easily made up for the previous lackluster meals. Off to shanghai at the absolute crack of dawn tomorrow morning…
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@LindaWhit, yes, there’s such a thing as being allergic to the sun. There are actually 3 types of sun allergies, but fortunately mine does not send me into an anaphylactic seizure. Still very very unpleasant to endure nonetheless. I have many other allergies and am anaphylaxis high-risk. This sun allergy is stems from my other allergies. Do some light reading about allergies and anaphylaxis on a rainy day if you want to. @chowdom is probably the only person on here who knows what it’s like to be living with allergies because we both have them.
Your chili is wicked indeed. I tend to refrain from scooping too much sour cream, or any cream really, because I can’t stop eating it. Cream makes many things taste so good!
@Ttrockwood, is that a naval officer in your alley photo? Awesome food again in Korea. I think I like Korean food, in general, more than Shanghainese food which tends to be oily.
Rainy and humid today so no grilling outside, unfortunately. Roasting a brill in the oven now. Tomatoes and mix herbs in a salad. Garlic bread takes only couple of minutes to turn golden after the brill is done.
I hope the weather is better in the next 2 days because I have got meats to grill! 
Spring lettuces with a drizzle of olive oil and lemon juice, and fried thin-cut pork chops with pineapple chunks that were quickly sautéed and caramelized in the pork fat with a little brown sugar.
The best part of the meal (to me) were some very fresh and flavorful romano beans I found at the farmers market; they were very earthy and green tasting. I gave them a quick sauté in olive oil with some tiny sungold tomatoe , then added a couple splashes of broth to finish the cooking. Once they were glazed, I tossed the beans with some diced little beefsteak tomatoes. I was very happy with this dish. You can barely see them at the top left of the photo.
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A few errands, including some for work. I’ve been exhausted all day, so a nap when I got home. Still tired when I woke up, so I wasn’t going to be going out - and dinner had to be easy.
I used some of Buster’s chicken tenders that were still in the freezer for Chicken-Mushroom Marsala. Served over linguine (probably the wrong pasta, but didn’t have anything else appropriate), with steamed green beans alongside, as well as a glass of wine.
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Finally able to spend some time in the kitchen today. Made two batches of pizza dough. One for the freezer and one for tonight.
Made a few small pies.m. First was a bit of sauce, fresh mozzarella, spicy sausage, asparagus, and sun dried tomatoes. Really delicious.
Second was sauce, mozzarella, soppressata, parmesan, and basil.
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