Grillin’ Time

Good Morning!   The give-away from my last post will be on through the weekend, but I just wanted to pop in with a few things.  First, thanks to everyone for the helpful suggestions for organizing my trip photos.  I plan to try out a few of those suggestions later today.  I’ll keep you posted on how that works out.  Second, Mom and I have enjoyed reading all your comments about our fabric line Sanibel.  The favorite colors were (by a landslide) brown, aqua blue, pink, and orange.  So, were you wondering why I asked everyone to vote on their favorite colors?  Mom and I are set to start our next line together shortly and the first step is picking the colors.  Honestly, sometimes that can be the hardest part.  There are so many gorgeous colors to pick from and it’s hard to narrow it down.  We will definitely consider your suggestions in our color selection, so thanks!

In the meantime, I thought I’d blog about meat today.  If you would have asked me 10 years ago if I liked meat, I probably would have said I could take it or leave it.  In fact, I think I really only ate chicken, hamburgers, and roast.  Then I met Joel and things started to change!  It didn’t start out that way – In fact, on one of our first dates he ate a bloody steak and I almost ran from the restaurant.  I didn’t answer his phone calls for over a week until he started bringing me blended lattes.  (I didn’t drink coffee before Joel either.)  Ever since we’ve been married he’s been crafting up his “meat goodness” and slowly winning me over.

He got me started with grilled meats. 

Then he bought a smoker and started making his famous ribs –

He also smokes brisket, pork roasts, chicken, and coming soon, salmon.

Then, he made this –

and I had my first taste of prime rib. 

See that come hither look on his face? 

It’s not for me. 

It’s for the meat!

Here’s a shot of the rub – kosher salt, rosemary, thyme, olive oil, horseradish, and garlic.  Yum!

 

He’s even won me over to pink steak, so today I thought I’d share my two favorite ways to grill steak. (or for him to grill me steak!)

First, you need the right rub.

4 T.  garlic powder

2 T.  kosher salt

4 T.  corn starch

2 T.  paprika

2 1/2  T.  black pepper

1/4 t.  white pepper

1 t.  thyme

Next, brush the steak with olive oil so the rub will stick.   BTW, my favorite steak is rib eye, as shown in the picture below. ( This steak was cut off the end of the prime rib, as they usually come in such big pieces that they feed 20 people.  Also, the price is usually better if you buy the big piece of prime rib and cut it into steaks yourself.  This prime rib was from Sam’s Club)

Add 1 t. of rub to each side of the steak (or a little more if you like a little more spice)

Heat the grill up – On our grill, I turned all 3 burners on high, so the temp was about 450-degrees.  Grill each side for 3-4 minutes each.  3 minutes if you like them with quite a bit of pink, 4 minutes if you want them a little more done.  While grilling these steaks, I made the mistake of running into the other room and not watching the grill.  In the meantime, the meat started a grease fire, which turned the one steak black and burned up the stick in one of my kabobs!   It still tasted fine though –

Let the steak rest for 5 minutes before serving.  This is very important, as this allows the juices to absorb back into the meat so you don’t end up with a pool of blood on your plate. 

Do you see something wrong with this picture?  If you said that steak is twice the size of the vegetable serving, you would be correct.  The food pyramid would not approve.

The key here is not to over cook the steak.  I used to only eat meat that was brown all the way through.  It’s not wonder I didn’t like steak!  By then it’s so tough you can’t even chew it. 

It’s really that easy to make a good steak.   Plus, I think it’s better than most steaks that you would pay $20 for in a restaurant.  The veggie kabobs are really easy to.  Just cut up veggies, drizzle with olive oil and season with black pepper, kosher salt, and garlic powder.  Grill right along side the steak.  The veggies are really good dipped in blue cheese dressing or T. Marzetti’s Southwest dipping sauce.

My other favorite steak recipe is from the Pioneer Woman.  This is more of a girly way to serve steak and it’s called Ginger Steak Salad.

It’s so yummy!  You can follow the recipe here http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2009/03/ginger-steak-salad/.  The only change I made was to cook my steak on a grill, instead of a pan.

I hope you enjoy these recipes.  As I mentioned, it’s been a bit of a process to get me eating meat.  But, living with a self-proclaimed “meat-i-tarian” will change your mind.  So will going to Italy and tasting their bacon, sausage, and salami.  It is nothing like what we have here!  In fact, here’s a shot of Joel in Italy, admiring the meat.

Joel also loved the Jamon Serrano in Spain.  He is now threatening to fence in the yard, buy a pig, feed it acorns, and learn to cure his own ham.  Yikes.  I wouldn’t doubt if he would pull it off, but I really don’t want a pet pig.  Joel was telling this story to a lady that we met in the the airport in Madrid.  She got this pained look on her face and told Joel that if he watched Charlotte’s Web that he would change his mind. 

Let’s just say that it’s gonna take a lot more than that movie to stop him.  In fact, that won’t even work for me, and I’m just a meatitarian in training!