Grilled Corn

Being from Iowa, we LOVE corn!  I was so excited to see Hy-Vee carrying it already.  My goal is to get us as dairy-free as possible (or me, really, the kids still need milk) so I decided to try something different.  OMG it was so delicious we all wished I'd bought more corn! 

Ingredients:
- Corn
- extra virgin olive oil
- seasoning of your choice (I used Wildtree's scampi blend)

Directions:
- Husk and wash corn
- Place corn on a plate and lightly drizzle with EVOO. 
- Lightly sprinkle your choice of seasoning on the corn
- Roll the corn around until it's evenly dispersed.
- Grill at about 350-400 for about 10-15 minutes, using a tongs to roll the corn every few minutes so it's evenly cooked.
- Remove from the grill and enjoy!

Grilled Hawaiian chicken

Wow it's been a while since I posted.  The past several months have been a whirlwind. We moved (twice!), survived the coldest winter in 30 years, and did our best to keep miss T healthy.  Throughout it all I failed miserably at taking pictures of stuff I made.  There are a few tidbits to share later, but this is my "get back on the bike" post.

A couple of years ago I was in the grilling department at my company.  A grill vendor came in and made us a full on meal using different grill attachments.  One of the dishes had chicken, pineapple, and some other yummy stuff.  Well as soon as it got warm I pulled the grill out and started getting creative. Cub had a new Hawaiian marinade, and while the hubby and kid played in the gorgeous outdoors I chopped, marinaded, and grilled.  All you need is some chicken, part of a pineapple chopped into small cubes, and red and green peppers chopped into cubes.  The chicken marinaded overnight while I tossed the veggies and pineapple right before putting it on the grill.  Our trusty grill pan did the trick, and 10 min later dinner was served!  It was delicious.  

Two of my signs of a good meal: 

1. My husband eats it even if it has veggies in it (ESPECIALLY peppers)

2. It heats up well as leftovers 

The pineapple was just as juicy and tender a few days later for my lunch, and this turned out way better than I had imagined.  It's definitely going into the rotation this summer!

Summer Squash

Does anyone else have squash coming out their ears this time of year?  Our CSA boxes have been filled with zucchini and patty pan the past two weeks.  Miss T isn't a fan of zucchini (sad!) so I've had to get creative.  In this week's newsletter, which comes with the box of veggies, there was a recipe for baked patty pan.  Now, while my intentions were to print the newsletter and follow the recipe, it just didn't happen that way.  Does anyone else feel that time gets away from them and their life is more than a little disorganized?  That's me right now.  It's tough for someone who thrives on organization.  Anyways.....I recalled one thing from the recipe and that was to season it with cilantro.  So I pulled together some stuff from my fridge and the CSA box, and threw this together as a side for dinner tonight.  We served it with marinated grilled chicken and tater tots.  Yep, I know, not healthy, but delicious! 

Ingredients
1 yellow patty pan (large)
1 fresh sweet onion (they're the smaller ones with stalks)
1-2 sweet red peppers
1/2 a large zucchini
~5 stalks of cilantro, shredded
1/2T EVOO
sea salt (to taste)

I diced it all and stirred everything together, then we tossed it on the grill pan for about 10 minutes.  It was delicious!  (I neglected to take a photo of the cooked product, because we dug right in!)

Kabobs

Another grill favorite of ours are shish kabobs.  We are pretty plain people, so the veggies tend to feature green peppers and onions.  Not much else.  I'm attempting to increase our veggie intake, and had a bag of sweet peppers in the fridge.  I added some of those to the mix, along with some wedges of lemon.  Those were quite the experiment, but I loved the way they looked on the kabobs as well as the scent. 

 

My mister was very hesitant to try lemons.  There may have been some complaining, and a request to keep them off his kabob.  I may have added a couple anyways :)  I have to admit, the lemons were challenging to grill.  They kind of fell apart, and off the stick.  But they added a nice taste to the meat.  Very refreshing.  I love kabobs because they generally leave leftovers that are easy to heat up for lunch the next day. 

 

 

 

Zucchini + Patty Pan



This was our first "real" week of the community shared agriculture crop share.  After watching One Direction perform at work (hello fantastic perks!), my friend and I went to pick up our share.  This week they had tons of good things, including zucchini and patty pan squash.  Now I hate squash.  My mom could tell stories for days about how much we all hate squash.  While the main purpose of the CSA was to get a variety of veggies for T, I also wanted the hubby and me to try more veggies as well.  One of my co-workers, who is a CSA veteran, said the key to using your veggies is to make dishes with as many as possible. 

 

One of the tips given by the farmer was to grill the zucchini.  To spice it up, I drizzled olive oil over the zucchini and patty pan, then added fresh cilantro, basil, and garlic scape.  We cooked it on our trusty grill pan for a few minutes each side.  Delicious!  Mark wasn't a fan of the zucchini but had 2nd of the patty pan.

 

Now for Miss T's portion.  I chopped hers as well, then wrapped it in a foil pack with a little bit of water.  After sealing it up, we tossed it on the grill while the rest of our food was cooking.  I removed it from the grill after about 15 minutes, then set it on the stove top to cool/finish steaming while we ate.  It turned out perfectly!  They pureed well without having to add any liquid.

Veggie Chicken for the Grill



We love grilling in the summer.  We especially love our grill pan, because diced meat and veggies cook up so quickly.  Even though we work early hours, nights are still busy and quick dinners are key.  Yet we need something that is balanced and fills us up.  I've been trying to add veggies into our meals, especially to take advantage of the season.  These sweet peppers have become favorites.  My hubby grumbles (he's a veggie hater, unless it's corn...need I say we're from Iowa?), but he grudgingly will eat some. 

This dish turned out amazing, if I may say so.  I diced chicken as usual, and added some chopped peppers (yellow, orange, and red).  To spice it up I added diced purple onion, fresh oregano from my garden, fresh sage from our CSA, and some grilling seasoning.  It took about 8-10 minutes to grill on the pan, and we used it to top pasta.  It would also go well with rice.  Delish!

Grilled Turkey with Apples

We broke the grill out tonight and tried out a new combination.  It turned out pretty well!  (Note: I didn't measure out exactly so calories are approximate).

1/2 package of 99/1 turkey cutlets
Lowry's marinade (garlic & herb)
1 apple, sliced vertically
fresh green beans

Soak the turkey cutlets in a few tablespoons of the marinade in a bowl for at least 30 minutes.  (This is the part I didn't measure.  I struggle with the marinades because the calorie count is low and since most of it is left in the bowl I'm not sure how that counts).  Toss the turkey on the grill once it's around 450 degrees and cook about 5-7 minutes each side.  Slice the apple and add that to the grill, cooking 2-3 minutes per side.  While these are grilling, cut the green beans and add to a microwaveable pot with a little water.  I use the Pampered Chef pots, which are great for steaming veggies.

After the meat and apple is cooked, measure out your portion and enjoy!

Approximate calorie count of my meal:
3 oz turkey: 90 calories
green beans: 30 calories
roll: approximately 100 calories
apple: 95 calories (Mark ate one tiny slice so I'm counting the whole apple)
marinade: ???
Total: 315 (+ marinade)

 

Note: I ate dessert too, so don't worry I had more than my share of calories today.  Snacking is still my main issue!!