Tonite's Menu:
Shrimp Stir Fry
Grilled Flat-Iron Steak
Red Cabbage Cole Slaw
Grilled Sweet Corn with Garlic Lime Butter
Ice-Cold Water Melon Slices
Dane's Home Roasted Ethiopian Coffee
oh...
and chocolate cupcakes too!
First, the credits:
The Shrimp Stir Fry was based on an awesome guide I found in Food Network Magazine. Very handy guide! I used what was fresh from my garden ( snow peas & broccoli) made one mis-step that turned into a blessing; rice wine vinegar instead of rice wine... I added a little honey to balance out the extra tartness and it was swell. Anyhow, the recipe 'works', I will come back to this guide which had some very handy tips. Worth buying the magazine for even though I didn't! It was a much appreciated gift ;-)
The Cole Slaw I whipped up in 10 minutes flat! First I sent my man (he had shoes on...) out to the garden to get me a nice fresh tight head of red cabbage, I LOVE this time of year! I shredded it and tossed it in a bowl with an awesome Garden Relish I canned recently. That's it! This was set in the fridge to chill/marinate while we worked on the rest of the meal. Could not have been easier...! (the link goes to "The Old Farmer's Almanac Garden Fresh Cookbook" I loosely based my relish on the recipe on pg 158)
The Grilled Corn was boiled for 5 minutes and then the guys threw it on the grill for a bit to get those nice grill marks and some smokiness, yum. I melted a stick of butter, added 4 or 5 cloves of garlic minced small. I placed the corn on a platter sprinkled it with Key Lime Juice, poured the Garlic Butter on top and another sprinkle of the lime juice. Simple.
The Flat-Iron Steak was an offering from our friend John... WOW! What a wonderful sexy cut of meat! Of course with Food TV almost everyone has heard of the Flat-Iron steak. This being my first experience with it, I will say it is everything it is cracked up to be and I am a convert. Since I was not the one to grill this baby, I am including a nice grilling guide I found here. John bought the steak, about a pound and a half, threw it in a bag with a teriyaki marinade and threw that in the freezer. We thawed it in the fridge and the guys went outside and did whatever they did to it on the grill... It came back in rare to mid-rare and freakin' delicious! Bravo Boys!!
All that food talk aside, this is really what it is all about; sitting down with loved ones across the table from one another and simply breaking bread... We may not sit and break from a communal loaf these days, but this meal was certainly a communal effort. We each contributed to the meal, we prepared it together and sat to eat and talk and enjoy it and each other together. This entire weekend for me ran in the same vein. The night before our friend Lukas dropped by and we shared a similar night of fellowship.
As I lay in bed not sleeping (due to several cups of Dane's amazing coffee) I realized that this was what I had been waiting for and working for, for a very long time. I, though not sleeping, was 'resting' in the knowledge that I was doing what I was 'made' to do... All my life really I've had this sort of nagging desire in my inner parts to open a restaurant, or a cafe, or or or... something. A part of me knows that, just that, in itself isn't 'the thing'. But it resembles the thing. Not just any restaurant would do, a bed and breakfast type is what most comes to mind when asked to ponder what I would do if I could do anything I wanted to do. But really, what I love to do is grow good food, go out and harvest it and create beautiful tasty food with people I love and serve them and sit and eat and get to know them better in the process.
I'm so grateful to my husband for taking that leap and deciding to 'go for it' out here on these 40 acres with me. I told him that the kitchen would be what makes or breaks it for me, but I'm not sure if back then he really got what that meant. He let me have pretty much free-reign though within our budget to create the sort of space that I could live out my dream in. Where I could be fully a part of all that goes on, interacting easily with my guests while at the same time at work in my kitchen. It's been a long time and a crazy amount of hard work but completely worth every bit of it.
Thanks sweetheart, I can't tell you how much I appreciate that! And a big thank you too, to John and to Lukas and, to my friend *Christine and yes, to God for helping me to open my eyes to the reality that I AM living the dream...
*Christine is a gifted history writer and a story teller who is currently living out her life dream in her own way. Reading her post made my heart sing in recognition.:-)
Ok, so here's an after thought. Unless we are actively running in the opposite direction, perhaps we are all doing what we are made to do at any point in time, good or bad... comfortable or not...? Perhaps it's just once in a while we 'see ' it, or know it, or agree with it or feel good about it... I guess this is not meant to be a complete thought, just to provoke thought.