Flood Zone Lasagna

Flood Zone Lasagna 

Camper's battle with my housemates is settling down. All last week, when they went to turn on a light, they accidentally turned on one of the ceiling fans. Of course this makes Camper furious and he barks at the spinning fan and then runs, barking, to check all the fans in the other rooms. It has gotten to the point that whenever one of my housemates goes down the hall, Camper follows them, all primed and ready to blow a gasket.

I think they turn the fans on just to annoy me.

Every day it seems, my housemates discover a new rule that they didn’t know Camper enforces. Over dinner, the relate to me all the rules they broke during the day. Through all of this, Camper is going from table table while Squeeky is behaving like a saint. One day last week, we dined on lasagna while discussing the restrictions camper was placing on them.

Sauce

4 tbs. olive oil

4 cloves of garlic

1 tsp. thyme

1 tbs. oregano

1 tsp. basil

1 tsp. white pepper

2 28 oz. cans of crushed tomatoes

2 tbs. grated parmesan cheese

Lasagna

1 box of lasagna noodles

1 lb. Italian sausage

1 clove of garlic, smashed and minced

Olive oil

1/2 lb. sliced Colby Jack cheese

1/2 lb. shredded Cheddar cheese

1/2 lb. shredded Mozzarella cheese

1/2 lb. sliced provolone

15 oz. whole milk ricotta cheese

2 cups grated parmesan cheese

1 cup red wine

Preparation

Place the crushed tomatoes in a large bowl. Smash and finely mince the garlic and add that to the tomatoes. Add the thyme, oregano and basil along with the white pepper. 

In a cast iron skillet, add enough olive oil to coat the bottom. Add the Italian sausage and break it up. Add the garlic and cook, stirring until the sausage looses its pink color.

Grab one of those big aluminum disposable lasagna pans and place it on a large baking sheet. Once it is assembled, the lasagna will be far too heavy for the disposable pan to lift without a baking sheet. Ladle on a thin layer of the sauce. 

(The following is just a guide. Fit as many layers of pasta and cheese as the pan will hold.) You can add the lasagna noodles without cooking them. Add a layer of the noodles to the sauce. Now add the Italian sausage evenly over the pasta. Cover the sausage with the parmesan and the provolone cheese. Add another layer of sauce and then a layer of noodles. Add the ricotta cheese and some more sauce. Add another layer of pasta, more sauce and the Cheddar. Add another layer of pasta, more sauce and the Colby Jack cheese and then sprinkle on the Mozzarella cheese. Pour the glass of wine on the lasagna and shake it a little to let the wine settle in.

Bake the lasagna with the pan on the cookie sheet at 350˚ for about a forty five minutes. The cheese should be golden and the sauce should be bubbling. Let it sit for fifteen minutes before slicing. While it is resting, pick out a bottle of Chianti Classico to drink with your lasagna. 

Serving

Serve a giant wedge of the lasagna next to a large slice of spinach pie. Now add a big crisp salad and some homemade bread. If I’d were you, I’d open a couple of bottles of Chianti Classico just to be safe.

Tacos With Recycled Chicken

Chicken Tacos With Recycled Grilled Chicken

Last weekend was another busy weekend in our devastated neighborhood. For the past week, all of our dinners were late dinners, with about twelve or fourteen people at my tables. Everyone was weary each night, after a day of clean-up and bleaching. You wouldn't believe the mess that was left behind from the flood. 

Our dinners consisted of lots of food and over the last few days, we accumulated an assortment of leftovers. Sunday night was leftover night. We had leftover lasagna, pasta with lamb, cheesy pasta, grilled sausages and a giant salad. 

I also had two large grilled chicken leg quarters which needed to be used up. I decided to make tacos with them. 

While I normally mix my own seasonings,  we had two packages of Lawry’s Taco Seasoning and, I must say, it was quite good. I had a few bottles of lime flavored light beer too. I consider light lime flavored beer to be undrinkable, and it seems that I always have a bottle or two, that people leave behind. This was a good use for one of them. Here’s what I did.

Chicken from 2 large leg quarters,

chopped (about 3 cups)

Olive oil

1 medium onion

1 large jalapeño, chopped

2 packages of Lawry’s Taco Seasoning

1bottle of light lime beer

1 lime, cut into wedges

1 package of large flour tortillas

Preparation

Heat a large cast iron skillet until it is hot. Add enough olive oil to coat the bottom. Add the chopped chicken and stir. Add the onion and jalapeño. Let that cook for about five minutes, stirring often. Squeeze half of the lime over the chicken and stir.

Stir in the taco seasoning until it is well mixed. Add the bottle of beer, stir and bring it to a simmer. Let that simmer until most of the liquid is reduced. Place the chicken mix into a bowl and rinse out your cast iron pan. Dry it and heat it over medium high heat for about five minutes, so it is hot and available to heat the tortillas as people serve themselves.

Serving

Have each person heat their own tortillas about 20 seconds per side and then place it on their plate. Direct them to add chicken, lettuce, cheese and hot taco sauce to the chicken. Squeeze on a little lime juice and roll it up like a burrito.

Along with the tacos, have them take some lasagna, pasta, chile, lamb chops and some sausage. Open several bottles of wine and slice the homemade bread. 

You know, there is one thing about this dinner that confuses me. We served a bunch of leftover food and yet, somehow, we ended up with more leftovers than we started with. It’s a miracle. 

A Cheesy Pasta With Whatever Cheese I Could Find

A Cheesy Pasta With Whatever Cheese Was Available

It’s been over a week since returning from exile after the Great Lisle Flood of 2013. My kitchen is still the focus of a lot of activity. Our dinners are large, multi-family feasts. I'm beginning to enjoy cooking for a crowd again. I forgot how much fun it is. 

Saturday we had grilled lamb chops, a pasta made out of grilled lamb steaks and some leftover sausage lasagna. Since we had a couple of vegetarians attending diner, I had to come up with an acceptable dish for them too.

Well, I surveyed the fridge and found that I had several open bags of shredded cheese, a couple of blocks of other cheese and a quart of whipping cream. Ok, I can do something with that. Here’s what I did.

1/2 stick of unsalted butter

1 medium onion, minced fine

2 cloves of garlic, minced fine

2 tbs. of flour

Smoked paprika

Trader Joe’s African smoke seasoning

1 quart of whipping cream

1 cup of milk

1 cup of shredded asiago cheese

1 cup of shredded Mexican cheese

1 cup of mozzarella cheese

1/2 cup grated provolone cheese

1 cup grated mystery cheese

1 lb. shell pasta, cooked and drained

Preparation

Note: Don’t start measuring all this stuff. I didn’t measure anything. I just guessed. Heat a large dutch oven and melt the butter. Add the onion and garlic and stir until the onions have just softened. Add the flour, the smoked paprika and the smoke seasoning and stir to mix it into the butter and onions. Cook for a couple of minutes.

Add the cream and the milk. Bring it to a simmer, stirring often. Once it is simmering, add the cheeses one at a time, stirring until each addition is melted in. Don’t ask what the mystery cheese was, I don’ know. A neighbor brought that over to have with the previous night’s dinner. I tasted it and it wasn’t bad, so I threw it in.

Once all the cheeses are melted into the sauce, add the drained pasta to the dutch oven. Taste it and adjust for salt and pepper. Stir well and place it in a 375º oven. Bake that for about twenty minutes.

Serving

Place a big pile of the pasta on the plate for the vegetarians and set it in front of them. For the rest of the neighbors, add a grilled lamb chop, some pasta with lamb and some lasagna. Place a tray of sliced vegetables on the table. Add a fruit salad. Slice the bread and open several bottles of wine. Ring the bell, dinner is served!

A Pasta Sauce Made Out Of Grilled Lamb

A Pasta Sauce Made Out Of Grilled Lamb

It seems that my neighbors are making progress in flood recovery efforts. By this weekend they got their house emptied out and are concentrating on bleaching fixtures. My street is lined with mountains of ruined possessions. I am a little concerned because some of that ‘mountain’ consists of discarded food and rotting meat from ruined refrigerators and freezers. After a week, it is starting to get ripe.

Dinnertime is still a community event, usually averaging between 12 and 14 people. Saturday, one of my neighbors dropped off about ten pounds of lamb. It consisted of lamb chops and lamb arm steaks. Here is what I did for our dinner

5 large lamb steaks

Cajun seasoning

Olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped fine

6 cloves of garlic, chopped fine

2 tsp. basil

1 tsp. oregano

2 cups red wine

2 28 oz. cans of San Marzano tomatoes

1 can of tomato paste

Salt and pepper

Preparation

Light a charcoal grill with a good layer of charcoal. Grill the lamb steaks so they are charred rare. Cover the grill to keep the coals hot for the lamb chops.

Cut the meat into bite sized pieces and discard the fat. Heat a large braising pan and add just enough olive oil to barely coat the bottom. Add the lamb and stir. Once it is sizzling, add the onion and let that cook until it starts to clarify. Add the garlic and stir. Add the basil and oregano. Let that cook for a couple of minutes and add the red wine. Bring the wine to a boil and let it simmer and reduce by half.

Add the two cans of tomatoes and break them up with a knife and fork. Bring the sauce back to a simmer. Rinse the tomato cans with a little more wine and add that to the sauce. Stir in the can of tomato paste until it is dissolved. Let the sauce simmer gently while you put the pasta water on to boil.

Serving

Serve big piles of pasta on each plate and then cover it with the sauce. Place a couple of grilled lamb chops next to the pasta and then add a pile of homemade mac and cheese. Now slice the homemade bread, put out the tray of sliced peppers, carrots and celery as well as a giant bowl of fruit salad. Open several bottles of red wine and ring the dinner bell.

Deep Dish Pizza For A Crowd

Deep Dish Pizza’s For A Crowd

By last Thursday, things started to settle down in the neighborhood as the flood recovery efforts continued. The family next door moved in last weekend and we’ve settled into our new arrangement comfortably. 

Squeeky and Camper love all the activity and attention. Camper is vigorously enforcing his rules, despite repeated violations. Accidentally turning on a ceiling fan and unauthorized wiping of a counter are the most frequent transgressions. My new housemates find it amusing even if Camper doesn’t.

Dinners are late because my housemates are working on cleaning, discarding and recovering the mess in their flooded house, until well after dark. One of my housemates made a great Tortellini Soup. It was garlicky and delicious. I made pizzas to go with it. Here are two of the pizza’s I made.

Dough

4 cups flour 

2 tbs. instant yeast 

1 tsp. sugar 

1 tsp. salt 

3 tbs. olive oil 

water 

Sauce

1 28 oz. can of crushed tomatoes

1/4 cup of extra good olive oil

1 clove of garlic, smashed and minced very fine

1 tsp. basil

1 tsp. oregano

1/2 tsp Cajun seasoning

Several grindings of black pepper

A couple of dashes of onion powder and garlic salt

1/4 red wine

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

Dash of Louisiana Hot Sauce

Pizzas

1 cup grated Italian provolone

2 cups grated asiago cheese

1-1/2 lb. shredded mozzarella cheese

2 hot Italian sausages, sliced

6 cups fresh baby spinach

1/4 lb. sliced mushrooms

Fresh ground white pepper

Corn meal

Preparation

Put the dough together according to my pizza dough recipe. Let it rise and divide it in half. Make the sauce by adding all the sauce ingredients to a bowl and mixing well.

Pizza 1 - This is the Deep Dish Spinach & Mushroom Pizza: Take one half of the dough and shape it into an 18” circle. Line a deep dish pizza pan with cornmeal. Slide the pizza dough into the pizza pan and kind of fold over the excess dough to make the deep edge. Cover the dough with plenty of sauce. Now evenly distribute the spinach leaves (all of them) over the sauce. Add the sliced mushrooms. Add a half cup of the provolone, one cup of the asiago and then cover that with about half of the mozzarella cheese. Grind on a little white pepper and place the pizza in the lower rack of a 450º oven.

Pizza 2 - This is the Deep Dish Sausage Pizza: Take the other half of the dough and shape it into an 18” circle. Line a deep dish pizza pan with cornmeal. Slide the pizza dough into the pizza pan and kind of fold over the excess dough to make the deep edge. Cover the dough with plenty of sauce. Add a half cup of the provolone, one cup of the asiago and then cover that with about half of the mozzarella cheese. Evenly distribute the sliced sausage over the cheese. Grind on some of the white pepper. Move Pizza 1 to the upper rack and place Pizza 2 on the lower rack.

Bake both pizza’s until the cheese is golden to dark brown. As you take the pizza’s out of the oven, have a large pizza pan ready. Use a metal spatula to slide the pizza out of the deep dish pan and on to the pizza pan. Let them sit for at least five minutes before slicing.

Note, I had a big group so I repeated the dough and sauce recipes and made Pizza 3 (a Deep Dish Pepperoni Pizza) and Pizza 4 (a Deep Dish Sausage Pepperoni and Mushroom Pizza). No, I’m not going to give you the recipes for those! Two recipes are enough for post.

Serving

Serve the pizza’s with a steaming hot bowl of Tortellini Soup. No I don’t have her recipe, but I’ll do a little sleuth work to find it. You also want a couple trays of sliced peppers, celery sticks, carrot sticks, broccoli pieces and some cauliflower. Now put out a bowl of fruit salad. For the wine, we served a bottle of Zinfandel and a bottle of Chianti. We also had three coolers full of ice cold beer. The pizzas must have been good. There were no leftovers.

A Quick Side Dish Out Of Leftover Spaghetti

A Quick Side Dish Out Of Leftover Spaghetti

With all the comings and goings last weekend, my kitchen saw a lot of action as my neighbors dealt with the aftermath of the flood. They were all exhausted but in remarkably good spirits. 

My street is lined with all of my neighbors’ worldly possessions. Scrap scavengers descended in droves and picked through the piles. Several were chased away by the police. One neighbor found one scavenger picking through another house’s back yard. She put an immediate stop to that (in her gentle, reserved manner). I guess you could say that she gave him ‘a what-for’ and I doubt that he’ll be back. She has a way about her that doesn't invite argument.

On Sunday, one neighbor from the next block grilled a huge batch of chicken and we had that available as people stopped in for a bite. I made a little side dish - to order - for anyone who wanted it. This is what I did.

2 tbs. of butter

1 clove of garlic, smashed

Leftover spaghetti, 1 or 2 handfuls

White pepper

Parmesan cheese for grating

Preparation

I did this one serving at a time. This is the procedure for each serving.

Heat a large skillet and melt the butter. Add the smashed clove of garlic and gently cook that until it starts to brown. Remove and discard the garlic. 

Add the spaghetti to the skillet and sprinkle it with some white pepper. Toss the spaghetti in the hot butter until it is all hot and well coated to the butter. Slide the spaghetti out on to a plate and grate a bunch of parmesan over the pasta. Repeat for each person requesting it.

Serving

This can go with almost anything. Most people had a big grilled chicken breast with it, along with sliced fresh peppers, celery, cauliflower, carrots and snap peas. They also had fruit salad and some ham and cheese bread. The wine of choice was Chardonnay. 

Neighborhood Spaghetti Under Difficult Circumstances

Neighborhood Spaghetti Under Difficult Circumstances

A week ago, I was finally able to return home after being evacuated from the Great Lisle Flood of 2013. I made a reconnaissance of the property and saw that the waters had retreated to the river. I verified that I had electric and heat, and then went back to check out of the hotel.

The neighbors were in a bad situation. The family next to me lost everything. I told them they could move into my house for as long as they needed. I told all the neighbors that I’d cook dinner for whoever could join us.

I spent the day cleaning up my bedroom and my son’s room for the neighbors. I changed the linens and did several loads of laundry.

When it came time to cook dinner for everyone, I noticed that, all of a sudden, I had no gas. I checked the meter and there was a brand new red tag on the shut off. Because the meter was under water, these clowns shut my gas off without telling me. My third load of laundry was tumbling around in cold air. Luckily, I had the heat on all day so the house was warm. It was cold out and would drop below freezing that night. I had to cook dinner for about fifteen people on my little camping stove! Here’s what I did.

5 lb. of good Italian sausage

2 large red bell peppers, cut into strips

1 medium onion, chopped

5 large cloves of garlic, chopped

2 tbs. basil

1 tbs. oregano

1 tsp. ground savory

Olive oil1 cup of red wine

White wine

2 28 oz. cans of San Marzano tomatoes

1 28 oz. can of crushed tomatoes

3 lb. of spaghetti to be cooked and drained

Preparation

This will go faster if you don’t have to do it on a camp stove. What I did was to light a wood fire in my muddy wood-burning grill (the insides were coated with muddy remnants of the flood - The water reached seven feet deep in my backyard). What I did was to place a large stock pot of salted water on the wood fire in the grill to boil. While the water is heating up, put a large cast iron pan on the camp stove and place the sausage in it. Cut the sausage into 2 inch lengths while it cooks. Cook the sausage until it is cooked through.

Place the sausage into a sauce pan and place that on the grill next to the water to keep warm. Put more wood on the fire. Cook the bell pepper and add that to the pot with the sausage. Place a dutch oven on the camp stove and add enough olive oil to coat the bottom. Add the onion, garlic, basil, oregano and savory. Stir and cook that until the onions start to soften. Add the red wine and let that simmer to reduce by half.

Add the first can of San Marzano tomatoes to a blender and then add the onions and garlic and liquid from the dutch oven to the blender. Blend until smooth and return to the dutch oven. Use the blender to coarsely break up the second can of tomatoes and add that to the dutch oven with the can of crushed tomatoes. Rinse the blender and the tomato cans with white wine. Return the dutch oven to the camp stove, add the sausage and peppers to it. Stir and simmer the sauce for a half hour.

By now the sauce should be ready and the water should be boiling on the grill. Place the sauce on the grill near the coals to keep warm and place the water pot on the camp stove. Cook the pasta in the hot water and drain it. Set up to serve the group. If your gas is out too, place another pot of water on the camp stove to heat it so you can do dishes. They’ll be a lot with a group this size.

Serving

Well, I had to break a cardinal rule of mine and serve this dinner without homemade bread. I couldn’t figure out how to do that on my camp stove under the time constraints I faced. No bread. We had spaghetti and sausage, cheese, olives, beer and wine. If I’m not mistaken, everyone had seconds, so I guess my efforts worked out well.

Roy's Pizza

Roy's Pizza

Whenever I think of my brother Roy, who passed away in 2003, a lot of memories come to mind. He died in Hong Kong. He was working on contract setting up systems to generate power using the gasses produced in landfills. Our mom was watching his dog Squeeky for him while he was there. Roy died in his sleep at the age of 39. It was quite a shock to say the least!

I guess you can say I inherited Squeeky from Roy, and she has been my constant companion ever since. I remember the first time he visited my house with her. She was so shy and skittish. Little did I know that within a year, Squeeky would be a member of my household. Often when I look at Squeeky, I think of Roy. Hard to believe that its been more than ten years!

My fondest memories of Roy relate to when he would come in from California to visit for a couple of days. He would stay at my mom’s house. Usually at least once while he was there, we’d all gather for an evening of beer and pizza. He’d make the pizzas right on the kitchen table while we’d laugh and tell stories. 

His pizzas were simple basic pizzas that he’d make using his homemade pizza dough and canned pizza sauce. He’d always make a crispy thin crust and the pizza was guaranteed to be delicious. He would roll the pizza dough out thin and pre-bake it a little. Then he’d add the canned sauce, cheese, sometimes sausage and sometimes not. Then he’d bake it to a golden brown and the crust would be thin and crispy.

I’ve always had my own weakness for pizza and I make them often. At times, I make them thin like Roy’s, as well as about every other way imaginable. Hand tossed medium thick crust, pan pizza, stuffed pizza and even double decker pizzas are all in my repertoire. 

Pizzas are great to serve when you have a large group over. I often do this. I start out with the first two, usually one plain cheese and one sausage. When these come out of the oven, I keep making them one at a time until everyone is full. I suggest you encourage your guests to have a piece or two after they say they are full. You can usually get them to have at least one more. It is fun to watch them after the ate too much. The look on their faces when they say “Oh my goodness, I ate too much!” is priceless. I make a ritual of it.

Tonight, however, in memory of Roy, I’m making his thin and crispy pizza that I came to love. The only thing missing will be his sharp wit and knowing smile which were as enjoyable as his pizzas.

Memories and burgers

Memories and burgers

When I start thinking about food and cooking, it always brings back memories. Memories from childhood as we all sat at the big table and my mom brought out lightly breaded beef liver fried with bacon and onions, along with fried potatoes. My sisters would moan in disgust, but I loved it. Other memories relate to holidays, while more recent memories involve my cooking for big groups on my Wednesday night dinners. Food and memories, they go together.

Do you know anyone obsessed with food? I have to admit that I’m probably guilty of being obsessed with food. I believe I always have been. As a boy, I remember always saving my milk until I was done eating my dinner so I wouldn’t get full too soon. Through the years, I’ve been called many things in my life, but never late to lunch.

When I think back to my days as a young boy, it seems that most of the memories I have in some way involve food. Why is that? I know that I nowadays I tend to relate everything to food, but was I obsessed with food even as a child? I guess so.

When you think back as far as you can, what is the first memory you can remember? That is a lot more difficult of a question than it sounds, at least for me. When I think back to my childhood, I have many memories, but which is the earliest? Hmm, I don’t know for sure. After thinking about it for awhile, there is one vague memory that comes to the surface as the oldest. It was a trip I took with my dad in the year 1960 when I was five years old. I only remember bits and pieces of the trip, and my dad’s retelling the story has filled in many of the gaps.

The trip was a fishing trip to Lake of The Woods in Canada. As best as I can put together, it was just the two of us and he rented a cabin on the lake along with a boat and motor. Now, if you are not familiar with Lake of The Woods, it is a huge lake on the border of Minnesota and Canada, although mostly in Canada. There are literally thousands of little bays and islands in the lake which goes on for miles and miles. If you are not careful, it is easy to get lost in it, it’s that big. We were up there to have a little time fishing and relaxing.

The part of the trip that my memory centers on began late one afternoon. We were in a quiet little bay not far from the weed line. My dad had me set up with a bobber to fish for pan fish while he was casting for northern pike. The sky was starting to darken as a storm was approaching. I remember my dad saying that we’d better reel up and head back to the cabin before the storm hits.

I told this story many times to my son, when he was growing up.

 

Just then, he got a big strike on his lure. We wouldn’t be going anywhere until we got the fish in. Well, to make a long story short, this was a huge northern, over 50” long and it took almost forty minutes before my dad had it reeled in. He attached it to a stringer and got ready to start the motor. By now the wind was fierce and it was pouring rain with thunder and lightning.

This was in the days before electric start, so you had to pull the rope to start the motor. My dad pulled, and he pulled. Soon he was out of breath and the motor hadn’t caught yet. The wind was blowing the boat further and further from the direction we needed to go to get to our cabin. After a while, he gave up on the motor and started to paddle with the one paddle in the boat. Try as he might, he couldn’t even keep maintain his position let alone gain ground on the wind. The wind kept dragging us further from our cabin out towards the center of the lake. I didn’t know until years later that he was really frightened.

Every so often, he’d set the paddle down and try the motor again, but to no avail. No matter what he tried, we were being blown further and further out into the middle of this huge lake. My dad finally decided to quit trying to fight the wind and instead try to steer the boat towards an island. He missed the first several we went by because the angle and the wind  wouldn’t allow him to make landfall. The thunder, lightning and wind were horrific. I was terrified of the storm and was crying which only added to my dad’s worries.

By now it was getting dark, and the rain was fierce, but there was finally an island which was well positioned for us to reach with the one paddle and the wind. Dad finally got us close enough to hop out of the boat and pull us into the shore of the island. The island’s shore was covered with these bushes that grew in the shallow water. He pulled the boat up as best he could and tied it to a to a stout branch. Next, Dad carried me, along with his poncho and a couple of boat cushions up to a spot on the bank under the bushes. He set me on the boat cushions and covered the both of us with his poncho. We laid there, huddled together under the poncho while a violent storm raged. The thunder and lightning were almost explosive. My dad held me in his arms while I cried myself to sleep.

At some point during the night the storm subsided and my dad roused us up as soon as it was light enough to see. We climbed out of the bushes up onto dry land. The sky was clear and as dawn brightened everything, we started to check out our surroundings. After a short walk we found a little footpath which led us around the point of the island and there we found a small cabin with a little boat dock.

After checking the surrounding area, Dad determined that this was the only cabin on the island and it was locked up tight as a drum. Dad explained that we had no choice and then broke into the cabin.

He asked me to stay in the cabin while he went to get the boat and bring it to the dock. When he got back, he found me swinging on a little swing out back nibbling out of a box of Cheerios that I’d found in the pantry. That was about the only food we found in the cabin. Dad didn’t have the heart to take it away from me even though there was a mouse hole in the bottom of the box. Using some Crisco he found, Dad fried up some chunks of the northern pike he caught as the storm hit which we made a meal out of. Mousey Cheerios and fried fish: the breakfast of champions!

With some tools he found in the cabin, Dad finally got the motor working and left a note with some money to pay for the broken lock. We had no trouble motoring back to our cabin, although the wind had blown us a long way across the lake.

Whenever I think of this memory, the first thing I think of is sitting on the swing eating the Cheerios I found. I didn’t have a care in the world. Fried fish, yes, but the Cheerios made the morning for me.

You would think that my first food memory would be a more elaborate meal than a mouse eaten box of Cheerios. After spending a wet, cold, stormy night without dinner, it was, in my mind, the best thing ever. Nowadays, when I think of comfort food, I think of thick, juicy burgers.

Burger butter:
 1/2 stick butter at room temperature
 1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese at room temperature
 1 shallot, finely minced
  Cajun seasoning
Burger patty:
 1 lb. ground beef
 onion powder
 Cajun seasoning
 Fresh ground black pepper

Preparation

Place the butter and the blue cheese in a bowl and add the finely minced shallot. Give it a generous sprinkling of Cajun seasoning. Mix briskly with a fork until well blended. Shape the butter into a 1” thick log and refrigerate. Cut into eighth inch thick ‘coins’ as needed. Save the unused burger butter to top off Steaks Charred Rare as they come off the grill!

Take the pound of beef and divide it in half. Place a butter ‘coin’ in the center of each half and shape each into a large 3/4” thick patty. Season both sides of the burger with equal parts of onion powder, Cajun seasoning and black pepper. Let it sit in the refrigerator while you prepare your coals.
Prepare a charcoal grill with plenty of coals. Let them cook down until they are glowing red with no flame and are very hot. Grill them quickly over the coals about 3 minutes per side until they are just pink in the center and nicely charred on the outside.

Serving

To serve these, take large hamburger rolls (the deli kind, or make your own) and grill each half to lightly toast them over charcoal. Place lettuce, sliced onion and sliced tomato on the bottom half of the bun. Add the burger and top it with ketchup, pickle slices and tabasco. Top with the bun and serve next to homemade french fries fried in olive oil and sprinkled with Cajun seasoning as soon as they come out of the oil. An ice cold beer served in a frosty mug goes real well with these burgers. Two of these burgers make a nice dinner after a three mile run. I know, I had them for dinner last night.