Grilled Smoked Salmon (&/or Chicken)

I often grill and smoke, with wood chips, a large salmon fillet. When Monte is out of town, I always grill either salmon or chicken breasts to have leftover cold on salads. I could eat this way all the time - simple, and GOOD!

After preheating the grill and getting the soaked wood chips going, I like to grill the flesh side of fish quickly on the hot grill. Then I turn it over with the skin side down, sprinkle with pepper seasoning and spread with mayonnaise. Then turn the heat down and let slow cook with the smoke flavoring it. The skin protects the fish from burning and it gets crispy.

If the fish isn't very fresh (which is most often since we don't live near fishing areas), I always do a presoak in the sink with some salt and milk and sometimes some sugar. It seems to help draw out anything 'fishy'. Then rinse (pull out any bones with needle-nose pliers, if any) and dry.

When grilling chicken breasts, I cut them in fairly thin pieces and marinate them in an Italian salad dressing for a bit (like at least an hour, or all day, or even overnight) before grilling. And brush them with the marinade while grilling, so they don't dry out.

Like I said, I will often do this just for me, but have also done it when we've got visiting scientists here for many meals. This will be one of the lunches along with bread and sandwich makings and a large bowl of salad. We usually have most of our meals buffet style with everything around the kitchen island for people to create their own plate's meal.

Grilled Dancing Chickens

"Dancing Chickens" on beer cans - grilled

We had overnight guests and I did my beer-can grilled chicken. When I made it for guest Norwegians a couple years ago they all (5 of them) had to get their cameras to take a picture of them on the grill! Travis gave me this recipe and made it for us a few years ago, and I named them "Dancing Chickens". I always do an extra chicken for leftover sandwiches and soup - the bones make the greatest broth that I like to use for my white chili chicken soup (which I'll be making soon and posting the pics and recipe. We've got more company coming for supper tomorrow night, but she's bringing most of the meal, so I'll probably make it Wednesday. Tonight I'm cooking and freezing the last of my large zucchini as a soup, and I'll be posting it's recipe ... it's actually a bit hard to think of soup when the weather is abnormally hot and dry for this time of year, but gardens often dictate menus.)

My greenhouse sink

GRILLED BEER CAN CHICKEN

Start soaking, in the morning, various chunks of wood for providing great smoke flavor. Since this slow cooks a long time I use large wood chunks with some smaller. Usually I use Hickory, but sometimes mesquite.

Brine the chickens for at least 3 hours. I often put the frozen chicken in a bucket and pour the brine over, and let brine overnight in our cool to cold garage - if it's warm weather, I  brine them in a cooler. If the chickens are snug in the container, I think this brine can cover up to 3 chickens.

1 gallon water (1 qt hot first, for dissolving salt and sugar, the rest ice-water)
3/4 C salt
2/3 C sugar (Travis uses brown sugar)
1/2 C soy sauce
several tsps of herbs: thyme, rosemary, bay, pepper, onion and garlic powder
1/2- 1 C olive oil
Submerge with a plate with a weight for at least 3 hours.
Rinse

Initially we did this with just the beer cans holding up the chickens, then I found the wire can holder with legs, which helps it not be so tippy. Open the beer cans and pour off half of the beer - poke, with a can opener, two more holes in the can top. Put the can up into the rinsed chicken. Sqeeze lemon juice over the chickens and stuff the lemon half in the neck hole. Sprinkle a herb seasoning mix over the chickens.

Make sure the grill is preheated on high for 15 minutes. Put the drained soaked wood chips on one side of the grill and leave this side on high the entire cooking time. Turn the burners under the chickens to low and close the grill. You want the inner grill temp to stay around 300 degrees. I cook the majority of the time with the burners off under the chicken, so their grease drippings do not catch on fire. But when I open the grill for occasionally turning the birds I'll turn their burners to high until I close the lid, turning them to low a bit and then off again, leaving one wood chip burner on high the entire time.

1 chicken cooks in about 1 hour.
3 birds in about 2 hours, but I plan for 2 1/2 hours.
Last night I did 2 birds and planned on 2 hours. My propane tank emptied some time in the midst, so they probably would have been done in 1 1/2 hours.
Pull the done birds off the beer cans to a serving board and enjoy!

Brining is good to do with a lot of meats. Salt pulls moisture out and after a little while it equalizes pulling moisture back in. So you're seasoning the meat thru-ought and not just the surface.

Monte 'stir-fried' veggies and greens in our cast-iron wok, but with no seasoning (therefore no chinese seasoning, leaving it for us to put what we wanted on ours), for the side dish. I had an artisan bread loaf fresh from the oven, with pesto and chopped tomato and chives in it for putting on the bread. George had to have one slice with honey on it. I'd made a rhubarb crisp and the electric ice cream maker churned the fresh yogurt ice cream (recipes posted here earlier).

We had sourdough pancakes for breakfast. And let them try the kale smoothie I posted. We sent them off with sandwiches of the deboned yummy chicken from last night on homemade bread.

As I'm writing this it's clouding up! YEAH!!!!! We might get some rain. We've not had rain for 1 1/2 months!

Ribs for Labor Day

Calendar Girl me never posted about Labor Day. I looked at my old blog where I did a lot of posts related to calendar days - the idea being that days have stories, mostly from history, some from our own family. Returning to these stories and memories on calendar days takes ordinary linear living into the EXTRAordinary cyclical, rhythmical living. Therefore bringing deeper meaning to our everydays. But Labor Day?

Labor Day is a day our country established as a time to remember that we labor, and it's a holiday from that labor. We tend to think of it as the ending of summer, school has started. We usually get our first frost soon after Labor Day and the hummingbirds leave right after Labor Day! It's typically a bar-b-q day.

We invited guests for Labor Day this year and grilled ribs, using my grandpa's barbecue sauce. I wanted to do ribs cuz I've not done them for a long time. Travis has taken over the traditional rib making for 4th of July at their place, and he makes a lot of this sauce. I usually have some of this sauce in my fridge. This recipe is in my cookbook, and I always quadruple it. I never buy barbecue sauce cuz this is the best!!!

SAUCE-PAINTED SPARERIBS

The Sauce:
1 C catsup
1/4 C lemon juice (fresh squeezed of course!)
2 Tb brown sugar
1 Tb soy sauce
1 Tb horseradish & mustard (half of each)
1 Tb grated onion
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/4 tsp each: oregano, thyme (marjoram ...)
1 clove garlic, minced (more)
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

Simmer this mixture for at least 10 minutes. I use organic catsup, and an already mixed mixture of horseradish and mustard. I cut back on the sugar this time. The soy sauce I use is Bragg All Natural Liquid Aminos - nutritious and way less sodium.

How many ribs per person? We get 1 pound per person. We often get a mixture of country style, spareribs, and some times babybacks. This time Monte had me write next to the recipe that he liked the spareribs best.

We roast them initially in an open pan at 400 degrees for an hour. Then put some sauce on, cover and cook at 325 till almost tender - maybe 2 hours. Then we grill a short time brushing on more sauce to carmelize the sauce, flavoring them better, and watching close so they don't burn. Most barbecue sauces are very sweet and the sugar burns easy! Then we put them back into the pan covered, and into the still warm oven till ready to eat.

The pictured plate is an older cooking of ribs meal when we'd had scalloped potatoes. This day's meal consisted of a large salad from my garden. And I made a chopped tomato and fresh basil mixture for putting on my homemade Italian bread: bruchetta appetizer. Then had rhubarb custard pie and homemade yogurt ice cream for dessert (all posted here).

STUFFED GRILLED POBLANOS!

We did Mexican for company Friday. We always crockpot some chuck and chicken for burritos, having shredded lettuce (we did chinese cabbage this time), chopped tomatoes, sour cream, and grated cheese. I always do a guacomole for chips, and salsa, while everyone's standing around helping get things together for supper, and visiting. I usually do a Flan for dessert, which I'm going to post too. But the specialty is stuffed grilled poblano chilies!

STUFFED GRILLED POBLANOS
6-7 Poblano chilies - these look like pointed bell peppers, though usually a darker green. Every store labels them different: like ancho (which is really dried poblanos) or pasillo ... So that's why I'm telling you what they look like.

Cut a slit down one side and remove the seeds, wash and drain. Spoon the filling in them. I stuff the filling, shoving it well in so it doesn't easily come out when cooking (it does, but it's worse if you don't pack the filling).

Filling:
8 oz grated cheese
1 15oz drained canned beans - I usually use black soy beans since they are higher fiber and protein. My next choice would be black beans; then pinto (which I've not used).
1/3 cup raisins
1/4 cup salsa
2 tsp chili powder

Sarah and her artistic looking plate

I soak mesquite wood chips for at least an hour and have a chip pan I insert under the grill grate on one side. I leave this side on high for the entire cooking time. Before I had a nice grill, I used to put the drained, soaked chips sealed in heavy-duty foil with holes poked in it for smoke escape.

On a preheated grill place the stuffed peppers away from the wood chip side on high. Turn the burners under the chilies to mdium - near the end I often turn these burners off, still leaving the chip side on high, for good smoke flavoring. Cook with the lid closed. I grill them about a half-hour. Turn them over half way through, but be conscious of the slit opening so you don't dump all the filling out. They should get some dark blistering on both sides. Remove to a serving tray and cover with foil till you're ready to eat.

Annie and Dawson taking bites

Cream Sauce
I don't think the recipe called for a sauce, but from my Rick Bayless Mexican cookbooks, I often make a sauce to serve the chilies with. He has you chopping onion, tomato, jalepeno and what-not and add to cooking cream. My simple version is to heat cream and simmer down a bit, to thicken, adding some salsa.

Authentic Mexican cooking for stuffing all sorts of chiles, burritos and enchiladas often adds some chopped dried fruits. Not a lot, but to have an occasional bite of a bit of sweet is good.

Travis took the pictures. Sarah's sister Annie and her husband Aaron were visiting from Oregon. Aaron and Monte in the pic below are looking at the kitchen garden. Travis and Sarah's dog Bea is on the grass.

Grilled Salad

I'm a gal who LOVES grilling! And I love grilled salads. Sometimes when preheating the grill, I'll often look in my fridge's veggie drawers to see what I might grill. And then too, with summer's produce, there's great fresh grilling items.

I was going to grill some ground turkey patties. I mixed in some olive oil and seasoning and shaped them into patties. What did I find to grill with them? Two portobello mushrooms, and eggplant, pepper, and onion. Sometimes I'll cut these up, using baby bella mushrooms instead of the large (the large are like "meat" and so good, like a burger themselves!). I'll marinate the cut up veggies in an italian salad dressing mixture. These are better cooked in a grill basket, and I like these served over rice.

Most times when grilling the sliced veggies, rather than messing with oil flare-ups, I grill them as is. Then put on a plate, and then drizzle them with good tasting olive oil and lemon juice and season. These, even left over, are great in sandwiches.

I put fresh picked salad greens, chives, basil, sliced tomato and avacado on my plate. I ended up cutting it all up, greens and grilled stuff, added some Newman's Italian salad dressing and feta cheese. Mmmmmm.....

And then there's my current grilling atmosphere: blooming Jackmani deep purple clematis, Salvia's May Night, baby's breath, Russian Sage, Roses, Negro hollyhocks, nasturtiums, daylilies, regular lilies, delphiniums, kiwi and grape vines. There's my bird feeders, birdbath, and if you look close on the left center, I captured a hummingbird.

Grilled Corn and Pesto Pizza

Monte's geology partner from Arizona flew in yesterday and I echoed grilled pizza from a previous post. But I tried some new things, learning more. We know Stan says he likes a pizza with anchovies, artichoke hearts, feta cheese, jalepenos, olives, and hot sausage. I'd have to try each of those things individually to test, but the pizza was too salty. I think the biggest culprit was the chorizo sausage I'd pulled from the freezer and crumbled and browned. I used it on another pizza with mushrooms and onions and mozzarella and that one was too salty too. The other night's pizzas were not too salty at all and all of the combos were good. In the future I'd just brown up ground meat and season it myself.

The best pizza last night was one I spread with pesto sauce, instead of the spaghetti sauce. I make up pesto from fresh picked basil every year and freeze, without parmesan, adding in fresh parmesan when using the pesto. Then I tossed on chopped tomato, mozzarella and parmesan cheese.

I did do a dessert pizza - good flavors but didn't work. I'd mixed some orange liqueur and orange peel into mascarpone cheese and spread on the pizza, scattering sliced fresh strawberries. The cheese started melting off the pizza. So I think this one would work with more of a crust lip, or not spread it to the edges. Too, because of the cheese running, we let it sit quite awhile to let it cool and not be so runny. But I also mixed up some yogurt ice cream, which I'm going to post next, which was a hit!

GRILLED CORN

The grilled corn was a hit with Stan. In the summer I grill corn all the time. I've read lots of recipes, and even have my son Travis's opinion, on grilling corn, and have tried probably all the options. Since I don't want to baby the corn and brush on stuff, I leave it in the husk and let the husk char black, with occasional turning. BUT I do peel off some of the outer husk and cut off the tip of silk and husk close to the corn top. Some will tell you leaving the husk on just steams the corn. Removing some of the husk eliminates this complaint. By charring, the silk is no issue either. So it's the simplest method for me.

I mixed up a butter for the corn. Plan on 1 Tb butter per ear of corn. So I did -
4 ears of corn
4 Tb butter
1 large canned chipotle with some of it's adobo sauce (I always keep this in a jar in the fridge), chopped
(1 Tb mayo - 0ptional)
1 Tb chopped cilantro

Grilled Pizza

I've been wanting to try grilled pizza and finally did last night. It was GREAT! ... and the guests, I wasn't planning on, loved it too. My last post mentioned our Velveteen House (from an old post on my old blog)(look at last post for the link). Well ... 5pm approached and as I was grinding wheat flour for the pizza dough, Dawson walked in, along with Tim and Gary ... and then Matt came, right when we were eating and pulled up another chair to the table on the deck ... and then while cleaning up, Splarah (Dawson's girlfriend) and Lizzie, scaring mommy and baby elk on their way up our road, ate more pizza, and said it was great ... and as I started, prior to this long sentence ... not expecting guests, but they arrived, I doubled the pizza dough and made 4 large pizzas instead of 2 on the grill. Monte picked salad greens from the kitchen garden, I'd made a dressing, and sitting on the deck eating and yacking with these young adults - a nice meal.

PIZZA DOUGH

-1C warm water
-1 tsp yeast
-pinch of sugar (I used succanat)
-1C flour
Slightly work the flour in, put the lid on the bowl (I'm using a Bosch Universal) and let sponge for 10 minutes, it should be bubbly.
Then add
-1 tsp salt
-(I added 1 TB of the Italian spice mix I mentioned in my last post)
-More flour (about 2 1/2C) till mixture starts cleaning the bowl and let knead for 6-10 minutes. (With WW flour it's best to have the dough still a bit tacky, not sticky, otherwise you've added too much flour and your bread will be dry. But this isn't as noticeable with pizza dough. I'll have to post bread making with fresh ground whole grain flour sometime. Detail bread making is in my cookbook.)

Turn on the grill to preheat.
While leaving the dough in the mixing dough to do some rising, get your pizza toppings ready. I had some natural pepperoni I'd removed from the freezer, a bit of ham left over, grated pepper jack, mozarella, and parmesan cheese, chopped some pineapple, sauted some onion and mushrooms, and opened a jar of spaghetti sauce. Also have a bowl of olive oil ready with a brush in it. And too, you need to oil the grill grate.

I divided the dough in 4ths and rolled them out on parchment paper. As you can see in the picture I stacked them on my pizza peal to take outside by the grill. Have everything ready by your grill. Have your salad and plates ready. Have a large serving board with pizza cutter ready. And beverage choice ready, sipping while cooking or waiting to eat.

Make sure the grill grate is clean and oil (I always keep a shallow bowl by my grill with a folded paper towel and oil). I kept one burner on high and the other side on medium. Put one pizza dough on the high burner. It'll start bubbling up. Check it for burning, but it seemed I left it there for 1-2 minutes, then turned it over onto the medium side. Immediately brush with olive oil and spread several spoonfuls of spaghetti sauce on and add toppings. Close the grill lid and cook till the cheese is melting - which seemed about 3-5 minutes. I pulled it onto the bread board for the guys cut it up while I began the next pizza.

You might ask, "You, Karey, are grilling? Don't guys usually do the grilling?" I always do the grilling. I love grilling. Monte never has grilled, unless helping me.

See the elk beyond our electric fence?