Barbecue Season in Full Swing.

So we were eating dinner two nights ago and decided wouldn't it be a cool idea if we took a picture of it and then wrote a blog about it.  So here it is.

We had ribs recently when some guests were here and on Sunday evening we decided we would go for it again.  Slow cooked on the barbecue with baked potatoes and a slightly spicy curried vegetable stir fry.  Brilliant.

Then on Monday evening we had some friends over for burgers and sushi.  Not a classic mix but everyone enjoyed themselves.  Our friends brought a turkey potato salad which I am filling my sandwiches with today.  It was a really nice evening catching up and finding out about their trip to Europe.  Someday, someday.

Other major recent events include my mother making it legal with her live in lover 15 years into the whole thing.  It was a lovely day and I am glad to have been part of it.  

We also celebrated the life of Uncle Dave down in Oregon. 

 We had a great time getting together with family, sharing meals, going on extended golf/shopping trips and swimming the not quite boiling Pacific. It really was a magical 3 days and from now on whenever we want to be close to Uncle Dave all we need to do it head down to the Oregon Coast.

Love out, The Dunnets.

It could be the floor

Well I finally got to the garage today. It has been getting to me for quite a while and I am glad to return the favour. It is so nice to walk out the back door and look down into a clean and organized carport. The best part is that now that the trailer is sold I won't have to rearrange for winter. Yosh.

Just a quick pet peeve here. So the guy who buys my trailer writes me a cheque for the money. I take that cheque to his bank where he has his account. I want to cash it. I do not have an account at the bank. They want to charge me $5. Its his freakin bank. The money I am going to get is coming from that bank. Dude is going to pay a service charge for writing the cheque. FIVE DOLLARS!! I was insensed. I did not slap anyone or draw a gun but I was real real close. Totally ludicrous. CIBC if anyone was wondering. Okay moving right along.

For dinner we did not have the nimono we were thinking of having. It was a hot day so the wife made a daikon and carrot salad and I barbecued up some chicken wings. I would give it a six. Not enough veg and still have to much barbecue anxiety about cooking chicken on the grill. This evening it was both black and a little pink. Definitely not my strong suit.
Here is the son sporting a new hair cut. He asked for it this time which was nice. He is still a little squeamish about people touching his neck. Think fifth child syndrome. I think the real reason he wanted the cut was for the lightning bolts. He thinks he is dash from the Incredibles. One above each ear and one down the back. He is definitely moving with more zip as a result.

Finished.

Well that took a while. However the bedroom is now officially painted. I mean I still need to rehang the doors and there are probably some touch ups to do and all the tape has to be cut away and taken down. However, the big part, the difficult part, the part where I spend three days sucking in paint fumes. That part is done. Once it is in display mode I promise to get some pictures taken and posted.

As for dinner this evening, I took an hour long break to barbecue and then devour some ribs. Of course ribs went on special today at the grocery store. We bought ours on Friday. Nice. They were good and yummy and with the green salad and roasted zuchinni it was a great dinner. Just would have been nice to buy the ribs on sale. Now the sale ribs are side ribs and we did have back ribs, hey lets live a little here. I mean the room is painted. Its time to celebrate.
Speaking of which, today the Mrs. went and baked up some cupcakes with the kids as an activity and then she made apple crumble for dessert. Talk about having it all. I will not go on at length but the apple crumble made with fresh transparent apples that were just picked ( I didn't manage to get all the apples when we made sauce) was so tart and sweet. I kissed it, slapped it and devoured it. Mmm good.

A quick visit.

Well we fired up the cue again tonight. After managing to get my mom to stay for dinner I got adventurous and made my own honey garlic glaze. To speed up the process I nuked the bowl full of sauce covered chicken on medium fir 7 minutes. The bbqing still took a while. However the mumma stuck it out and had a couple of drumsticksbefore she flew the coop. See what I did there. Huh, huh .. nice eh?
Currently the two oldest are off with mom at the park while I type one handed and try to entertain with my left. Note to sisters, it is possible but not fun.

Evening Stroll

So before the after dinner stroll and after the countless games of candyland we ate dinner. We had barbecued pork chops (filled the propane and washed the car at the same time) with coleslaw and rice. You will notice that though my plate is full it is also a mess. That is because I did the hacking for the kids and wife (she was holding the littlest) before I sat down to eat. No don't cry for me Argentina, I ate well.After dinner we took a stroll to the local elementary school. It had cooled off sufficiently to be nice outside. Notice the wife is smiling. A real candid moment.The kids did a bunch of climbing and chasing. Some of which I was involved in.
There was also some showing off. But not in a bad way.
Then I got them all to pose for me and amazingly they pulled it off. Shocker.My cup runneth over.

BBq is Back

Well we whipped up some bbq chicken for this evenings dinner. It was going to be shake and bake but turning on the oven that would have been madness, 33 degrees here today, 91 for our American readers. Funnily enough we were actually baking bread so I had to go outside and use the last of the gas. Note to self. Get more propane.
The chicken was good, the bread was out of this world, hot and slathered with butter. Boiled peas and corn with some leftover coleslaw and it was real barbecue here tonight. Day four of schedule madness was not quite as tight as it could have been but we have high hopes for tomorrow. Lots of bday party planning and cake making to get done. Note to self, keep camera handy.

Here are some more bread shots. This should last us two weeks.

Nice work Pork Chop.

Well, after getting in the Tuesday after school run I arrived home to pork chops soaking up some barbecue sauce and a hungry family. I quickly whipped out to the porch and set things a blazing. I know I am pushing my luck with how little propane is left in that guy but it keeps getting the job done. Anyways, once the heat got up there I threw on the chops and hit the showers. By the time I made it back out there was some good smoke and a tiny bit of flame so I turned, doused, brought the flame down and covered it up again. A few minutes later and we were ready to tuck into these bad boys.
Of course the wife had also whipped up a rainbow style salad. Great dressing, vinegar, onion, and feta for sure. Something else but I can't think of it now. Also some fluffy rice to top it off. Great. Post dinner we headed up to the dogs for a bit and then came back to ice cream cones and bath time. A little book reading later and all is quite. Ahh, until tomorrow at 5:30 or 6:00... little rest for the sort of wicked.

I've got Gas.

And with it I scalded me up some good steak and potatoes this evening. Yes, we broke out the barbecue this evening and after marinating some steak in soy sauce and crushed garlic we grilled it up. I also made some baked potatoes and wrapped up some onion, mushroom and butter in foil as well. It all turned out quite nicely.In another interesting turn of events today the daughter got a slight hair cut. When I say slight I mean dramatic. It is now at her chin whereas it used to be at the middle of her back. We also forked out for a good head lice comb. Not the 20 dollar affair (the Rolls Royce of head lice combs) but we have steel teeth and I am pretty sure it will do the job. We are tired of fighting this fight. I started back in late 2008. If we are not successful in the next month she is going to get a much shorter hair cut. Something along the lines of what I sport. Yes, she will be scarred. But aren't we all scarred, in some way.

Artistic Genius

So I know he is only three but I can't believe the picture my son took today. I mean the composition, the light dark contrast. The way the computer and my daughter are framed. I mean it is a beautiful picture. Maybe he just got lucky but I doubt it.

As for dinner we all got lucky. I started off totally lacking in drive and enthusiasm but as the cooking proceeded it all just seemed to click together. To start with I made two types of cooked salsa. A kids salsa which was pretty much a spaghetti sauce and a spicier version for the parents. It was only a small batch and I used a whole apple so it was quite sweet. However, it worked. The apple was a drop from the back yard. Once you cut out the parts that the bugs chewed through to get at the seeds the rest is great. The wife made her creamy garlic salad and cut up some of the egg plant we received from my garden guru. These were grilled on the bbq along with some of our tomatoes and some pork steaks. I just finished reading Fast Food Nation and am thoroughly terrified of the meat that they sell in stores. The whole thing with maple leaf killing people with listeria was exactly what the Eric Schlosser was talking about in his book. It just makes one want to go back to the earth. And its all about money, I mean really there is more to life. Enough ranting, I over cooked the pork and still had to microwave it when we cut in and found a little pink. It was delicious and I turned off that part of my brain while eating dinner. We may end up being vegetarians yet. Back to work tomorrow. Its been a good run. Manyana.

The Shish Returns

So since we were shut out last night on the shish kabobs we made them again tonight. Very worth while. The garlic, soy, honey et al marinade only had a few hours rather than over night but the pork still turned out very well. I unfortunately didn't cut the chunks small enough so we didn't intersperse with veggie chunks. Our worry was that the meat wouldn't be done or the veggies would be super burnt. As you can see we ended up doing the spears separately and we're damn glad we did. The tomatoes were awesome and the mushrooms were a perfect complement to the pork. There was also some sushi leftovers as a side and it was just as good today as it was yesterday. After dinner we all had a chuppa chup. (loot bag left overs) and now the kids are in the bath. You have to check out this video. This is a card my son got for his birthday. It is easily the best card I have ever seen and we have now listened to it at least a hundred times. I think there is something especially inviting about being able to wind it and make it go.

Birthday Part 2

So we managed to pull off a second wicked party. This was a family affair and we had something for everyone. Children of all ages, 3 to 40 something ish. Fabulous food fun and games. But lets not get ahead of ourselves. To start with there was a cake. This cake was finished last night while I simultaneously played in a free online poker tournament, which I also happened to win. Wife-ola baked the cake and I was in charge of decoration. The problem with the cake was making five cups of fire engine red icing. This was as close as we could get to fire engine red. I think it turned out reasonably. Once again my photography skills leave something to be desired and do not capture the true essence of the cake. It was delicious and fun and we gave out quite a bit of seconds. Which were in turn finished. Good on us. The wife also whipped up a whale of a menu for this afternings affair. There were both pork and chicken shishkabobs. They were wickedly tasty and we will be making them again tomorrow so we can have some. Did not plan out the servings appropriately and didn't realise they would be as big a hit as they were. There was also a big bowl or chirashi sushi which went over well. Some of our guests not only knew what chirashi sushi was but had had it on more than on occasion. Fill in the rest of the gaps were a solid pasta salad. A green bean salad made with some of the last fresh green beans on earth or at least in Grand forks and the requisite chips and dip. Finally there was some watermelon which leads nicely into the next part of the party. We played some games at todays party and they all ended rather abruptly. The popping a balloon by sitting on it went as fast as I have ever seen. Older kids make for quick popping. Then the suika wari (break the watermelon ) actually worked and the second kid out the gate cracked that sucker clean in half. Everyone else had a go with the larger half of the watermelon and we had two more direct strikes. Gotta get a much softer bat next year. Anyways, between trampolining, water sliding, cake eating, present opening and beer drinking (mostly by the dads) we wiled away a Sunday afternoon. Every one had fun and left with either a smile on their face or a loot bag (many had both). Party season is over and now we start mentally readying ourselves for the trip to Japan. Oh, its gonna be good.

Easy on the Cheesey

So this was the wife's request this evening. A pizza without cheese. It seemed so outrageously sacrilegious (which doesn't spell anything like religion and gave me a lot of trouble until I finally went to the spell checker) that I could only do a half pizza with no cheese. Strangely though it was awesome. The pepper salami was so much more vibrant when not smothered by cheesey goodness. Now lets not rush to any conclusions. My pizzas will still have cheese on them. However, I am commited to using a lot less cheese. And occasionally we will have some pizza al fresco. We also used the bbq this evening. With the hijacked pizza stone we are getting the good texture on the bottom of our crust. The bbq cannot do the whole job so I am still bringing them in for a quick broil before serving them. I like that slightly crisped up top. A little brown on the crust. Overall, my timing was off this evening -- what with not using the oven or a timer and experimenting with different temp settings -- and some of the pizzas were a little doughy. My daughter went through a whole little speech and was building towards the dough not being fully cooked only to finish with, "but I like it." Phew!


There were no accompaniments with this evenings dinner. It was a busy day. Summer does strange things to the timing of your average day. Yesterday was refixing the bathroom faucet and finding all the places I hadn't done it properly. Like most fix jobs I do I started just trying to do a little here or a little there so that I wouldn't have to take the whole thing apart. I found a piece that had to be replaced after trying to tighten it 3 different times, between 4-7 minutes each time. So that took a big chunk of time but the kids got to play at the park. After arriving back home I did the right thing and took it all apart back to the start and did it all properly and finally finished only to realise that the piece I needed to attach to, which was not replaced in this current episode, was now dripping. It was a small but expensive piece and had a small drip. I got a bucket and had some dinner.

So this is how these summer days get away from me. I mean I took the whole day today cleaning out the garage and getting ready for our garage sale tomorrow. And I am still no where near ready. Tomorrow is another day.

Dueling Salmon

So we had two salmon fillets this evening and we couldn't really decide what to do with them. So we did something different with each. One was salt, pepper, and freshly grated garlic. The other had dill and corriander. Tin foil pouch for each and then slapped on the bbq for 6 mins. The wife had whipped up some really creamy mashed potatoes. She had also stirred up some fried veggies. Nice light fare. We actually didn't need to bbq this evening because the wind storm today kept the temp down. Very pleasant. We walked down to the tasty treat after dinner and all had an ice-cream treat. A wonderful day to spend this the Tenth of July. Now the kids are in bed and soon I will be too. Ah summer.

Looks Can Be Deceiving

So we did not fry up a river creature for dinner this evening. Looking at the picture I am worried this is what you may have been thinking. It is not the case. It just looks like a fried up sea creature. In fact it is okonomiyaki. Those who like it like it a lot. It consisted of bacon fried, then covered with a pancake mix (batter, bean sprouts, cabbage, and others). The frying continues until it looks mostly cooked and then the pancake is flipped to the other side. This is me flipping an okonomiyaki. It is finally covered with mayonaise and okonimayaki sauce. Despite the uterlly revolting look of the above picture I assure you we ate two of these things for dinner and had the third cold for lunch the next day. Moving on. We also did a lot of playing while at the campground. The girl next door and our daughter became fast friends. The spent a lot of time playing at the park situated in the middle of the campground. Good times.


Continuing on with the dinners we had fire roasted chicken, unshucked fire roasted corn (to much fire not enough heat equals slightly raw corn), a lovely green salad with the yogurt and dill dressing/dip, liptons sidekick noodles (the second packet from the previous camping trip), and more marshmallows. I have really got my roasting technique down and served up some molten, crispy, sugar bundles. So good. My son's favourite saying right now. We went for chinese food for lunch today and that was all he could say. He also said that about the grilled cheese sandwich I made him for dinner, of which I only just realised I didn't take a picture. But after this fabulous three day trip forgetting to take a picture of a rather meager dinner cannot spoil my love of life. Starting to gird our loins, not for the field of battle jobu, but for the second birthday part. I wonder how that is going to turn out. Time will tell.

Post Party Blues

So the day after the party we were definitely on the downward part of the wave. To say it was a slow day would be a bit of an understatement. We really didn't do much. I mean we did swim in the river and both the parents got in their morning run. The water slide got put away and some laundry was laundered. Still it was a slow day. Once again we planned to get some take out and once again we reneged and bought some groceries. We had to get grocs for our camping trip tomorrow and the next day so I got some chicken to cook up this evening as well. Damn chicken breasts with the bone in take for ever on the bbq. They are great when they are done but they sure take their sweet time. They were devoured in short order after they were served up. We plan to take some potato salad camping with us so that was made with extra for this evenings meal. About half of that was eaten as well. Then we cut up the watermelon. We are watermelon people. The small fridge downstairs will partially freeze an orange so you can imagine the almost crystalized form the watermelon was in when it was sliced open. Perfect. Along with the Sol it was a magnificent dessert. As for the next two days we plan to take pictures and will dutifully up load whatever we take when we get home and have a chance. Garage sale this Saturday. Starts at 7:00am. Early birds will be shot.

Quicky Cue.

Well we had various dinner plans until about half an hour before cooking. Some of them involved various forms of take out. Others involved frozen foods. In the end we made barbecue. Unshucked corn on the cob roasted right on the grill. Potatoes baked to perfection. Pork Chops done in a sweet barbecue sauce. The pasta salad made a fierce comeback this evening. I am uninspired to give any more description than this. I barely have the strength to stay awake. I have to say that with one day to go till the "party" I will be very glad when it is done. I can't believe I am going to these lengths for two hours that most of these kids will probably not remember. Couldn't find face paint anywhere in town today. Did manage to get the second to last packet of water balloons. They were in the sixth store that I tried. There is a 40% chance of rain tomorrow afternoon. It just has to hold off till 3:30. If there is a higher power I will not make any demands. All my luck is being saved up for us to get to and from Japan without any hitches. The rest of the summer can be what it is.

Of Chard and Chicken.

The last of June saw us getting some birthday preparation shopping done and then we went out to the lake in the afternoon. The weather was brilliant and the water was refreshing. However, the water is starting to get warm and soon we will have to swim in the river instead. Some of our friends were at the beach as well so the kids had other kids to play with and we had some friends to go wading with. Just a great afternoon. It was a toss up whether or not we would go out for dinner on the way home but we persevered and it paid off. I made the chick pea and romaine salad from here although we used swiss chard and lime instead of romaine and lemon. The lime should have been a lemon but the chard being from our garden couldn't have been better. The wife barbecued the chicken. It was marinated in soy sauce, honey, japanese wine, salt, pepper and minced garlic. The rice was leftovers from a lunch and had bits of seaweed mixed in. What you do not see, is iocane powder, no it is actually some fresh salsa. I have taken to blending an avocado into my salsa and I am loving it. We made a spicy and a not spicy version so all enjoyed. As you can tell from the picture the spicy version was spicy. My t-shirt is actually blue.

Summer Begins

So with today being the last day of work and the first day of summer I think it fitting that I get a little slack for not posting last nights meal. There were no pictures taken and I was off gallivanting with friends so I cannot complain. Anyways, we had a great day today and from here on out it will only get better. We had friends over this evening for dinner. The same friends who had us to their house for a pool party. Note to siblings thinking about rearing children. The best baby sitters are children the same age as your own children. They have intimate knowledge of what will interest your children and keep them occupied. Back to dinner. You see I was a little enthusiastic getting into my dinner and took a whopping bite before remembering the picture. It was a great burger and in spite of what my mother says about improving my odds of getting cancer I like the blackened charcoal exterior. The overexposed white stuff is a home made garlic/dill dip dressing. We had a tangy green salad with crunchy noodles on top. There was also a potato salad but I couldn't get it onto the first plate. Those of you who follow this blog will know that I have learned never to have seconds with potato salad. Unfortunately, my learning curve is pretty shallow. The mildly over full feeling I have leads me to believe that my whole eating responsibly thing isn't working out. Tomorrow is another day. On a different note, our guests seemed to enjoy the meal and they brought wine which was enjoyed by all. Well most of the kids only had half a glass but that toddler man he can put it away. Good conversation ranging far and wide followed dinner and no one left till it got dark. A perfect start to what hopefully will be an awesome summer. I will try to take some garden pictures tomorrow, after the massive weeding session I have planned. Everything grows in the sun.