Monday, 2/28/2011

We reheated left over Barcelona Chicken from yesterday.  Although she didn't want any yesterday, Katie did a pretty good job eating her chicken tonight.  While she insisted on trying to eat directly off of the bone, it took some of Ben's help to get her the meat she wanted.  Our side salad was made of butter lettuce, glazed walnuts, craisins, and poppy seed dressing. 

Friday, 9/3/2010

Tonight Ben and I barbecued chicken drumsticks for Jenna and Matt.  I rubbed the drumsticks with our standard bbq rub.  Ben used Pendleton bbq sauce, because we were out of Jack Daniels.  It was a pretty good substitute.  We boiled several ears of corn to go along side the drumsticks. 

Ben and I stayed up late tonight so that we could watch The Blind Side.  What a fantastic movie!  It is definitely one we will own someday.  I don't remember the last time I saw a movie starring Sandra Bullock in which I forgot she was the actress.  I believe she earned the Oscar she won for that role.  Ben and I only have one more movie to watch that was nominated for the 2010 Best Motion Picture of the Year Academy Award--An Education.  I should make sure it is near the top of our Netflix queue.

Tuesday, 6/1/2010

We hosted our PEPS gathering this week. It was a little crazy trying to pull it together after just getting back from our vacation, but we did it:) I got a package of chicken drumsticks from Costco and rubbed them with our standard bbq rub. Ben worked the grill and got them perfectly cooked and coated with bbq sauce. They were spicy and a hit with the group! I opened up a package of mixed greens and put out a couple salad dressings for people to choose from. We had our first corn on the cob of the season. It will get better for sure, but it was still very tasty. And for dessert, we had angelfood cake with berries and whipped cream. I filled a clear salad bowl with 3 layers of berries- blueberries, sliced strawberries, and blackberries.

For the kids, I had Ben grill a couple plain chicken breasts, and I steamed some broccoli. Katie ate so much broccoli at the Chinese restaurant the other day that I was sure she would eat a bunch of it. Nope, she only played with it. Yes, it was all over the carpet. UGH!

Boy, those kids were soo cute! We hadn't been with the group for a month, so it was fun to see how much each of them has changed. I think they are almost to a point where they will play with each other. We put Katie and Ronan in our arm chair together for fun. Ronan has been known to feed Katie food during our gatherings:) Here's a photo of them together. They were grooving and clapping to Casper Babypants.

Sunday, 4/25/2010

A couple years ago Ben bought "How to Grill" by Steven Raichelen. We haven't tried very many of the recipes in it, but we love the Basic Barbecue Rub recipe (see below). We actually gave jars of it as Christmas gifts a couple years ago along with the recipe. What I like about this rub is that it is easy to put together, keeps for a long time, and doesn't need to go on the meat for very long to give it good flavor.

Tonight we grilled chicken drumsticks rubbed in this good stuff, finished off with a coating of Jack Daniels bbq sauce. The drumsticks cooked on indirect medium heat for 40-50 minutes- turning at 25 minutes. And before finishing, they were coated with bbq sauce, flipped, the other side was coated, flipped, and then cooked for two minutes. Finger lickin' good:)

BASIC BARBECUE RUB

1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/4 cup sweet paprika
3 tablespoons black pepper
3 tablespoons coarse salt
1 tablespoon hickory-smoked salt or more coarse salt
2 teaspoons garlic powder
2 teaspoons onion powder
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Combine all the ingredients in a mixing bowl and stir to mix. Store in an airtight jar away from heat or light; it will keep for at least 6 months.

A couple notes:
* We have never had the hickory-smoked salt, so have always opted to use more coarse salt.
* The published recipe calls for 2 teaspoons of celery seeds. We didn't have this ingredient the first time I made it and it was great. I bought the seeds later on and tried it again. We definitely DID NOT like it. So, no more celery seeds for us. But, if you find you like them, give it a try.