Barbecued Tri-Tip Roast, Marinaded of Course

My older sister turned me onto the tri-tip roast.  I visited her in Modesto a number of years ago.  We did the weekly Costco run and she picked up this glorious cut of meat.  When she returned home, she sprinkled on a little Montreal Steak Seasoning, fired up the grill and in less than 30 minutes, we had a slab of wonderful beefy goodness.

We'll cook a few roasts up for a large family get-together.  You can fit 3 large roasts on a grill at a time, so we'll flip them on a regular schedule and feed a mob of twenty in a hurry.

The tri-tip comes from the same area of the cow that the sirloin steaks do.  Which means that the meat is rather tender and there's not much of the evil chewy connective tissue.  This combo makes it perfect for grilling.

The great part of this cut is that if you use the meat thermometer as mentioned below, you'll naturally get a little bit of all the doneness levels.  All the center pieces will be a great medium rare, while the outside tip pieces are a little closer to medium well.  That way, if you have a group who like varied degrees of doneness, you'll have a little bit of each for everyone.

This marinade is best if you let the meat soak overnight.  You want to give it as much time as possible to soak in any extra flavor.  If you want to sprinkle on a little Montreal seasoning just before you slap it on the grill, it'll add even more.  But this is a completely optional step.

Barbecued and Marinaded Tri-Tip Roast

One 2-4 pound tri-tip roast

1/4 cup lemon juice, freshly squeezed
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
3 cloves garlic, smashed
2 tablespoons dried onions
1 tablespoon paprika
1 tablespoon black pepper
1/2 tablespoon thyme

Combine all of the marinade ingredients into a large ziploc bag.  Seal and either shake or squish to combine.  Gently add the roast to the marinade to avoid any accidental marinade splash-back.  Close the bag and shake or squish again to ensure the roast is covered.  Crack open the seal and press any excess air out of the bag.  Then reseal the bag, place the bag inside another bag or plastic container to prevent unintended leaks and let it chill in the fridge for at least 3 hours, 6-8 hours or even overnight is better.

When ready to grill, clean the grill and lubricate the grates with non-stick spray.  Crank your grill up to high and let it heat up with the lid closed for 10 minutes.  Reduce the heat to medium and place the roast (with a digital thermometer probe in it) on the grill.  Close the lid and allow to cook for 6 minutes.  Flip the meat and cook for another 6 minutes.  Continue to flip it every 3 minutes thereafter until the internal temp reaches 140 degrees.  Remove from the heat and cover with tin foil for 10 minutes.  The carryover heat will take it to 145 degrees and the rest will give the juices time to soak back into the meat.  Slice it to whatever size you wish to serve.

So grill up a tri-tip tonight and feed the whole family fast.  By the way, the leftovers make steak sandwiches.

Best... Father's Day/Anniversary Gift... Ever... The first That Means We Get Pie Cookbook

My wife Liz is FREAKIN' AWESOME!!!

We had our 7 year anniversary a few weeks ago.  And with it being Father's Day as well, she wanted to get me a great combined present.

And what did she get me?

The first ever That Means We Get Pie Cookbook!!!

She made it herself.  One hundred pages of the recipes from the blog that we use the most.  Built it in all the free time she had chasing two munchkins and holding the 3 month old in her arms.  These take HOURS if not DAYS to create, so I REALLY appreciate all the work she put into it.  She's a Superwoman, what can I say.

Which means that we're going to be publishing this and a few other cookbooks in the near future, including e-book versions of each, so you can read it on your tablet or phone!!!

So keep watching the blog for more details!

Chocolate Gelato and a BUNCH of other flavors

We've made a few different types of ice cream and frozen treats so far, like the simple 1-1-1 Ice Cream and a little Sorbet.  But maybe you're looking for something a little richer.  Something that will both cool you off on a 100 degree day, but will cover your tongue with a wonderful creamy chocolatey coating, making every tastebud happy.

Then this is the type of ice cream for you.  Gelato is similar to your basic ice cream, but the fat content is higher.  While out previous recipes have been very basic, this recipe involves egg yolks.  The extra fat and proteins in the yolks bring a whole new level of richness to the cream.  This is a cooked ice cream, and since we're dealing with egg yolks, we'll need to enlist our tempering skills that we use in the cream pies.  Basically, it's the way we can add the egg yolks slowly into a hot mixture without making Scrambled Egg Gelato.

Now this recipe is for Chocolate Gelato because, well, chocolate is gooooooooood... but you can create almost any flavor by following these rules.  Different ingredients should be added at different times so you don't bind up the ice cream maker.

1.  Vanilla - As you take the mixture off the heat, add an extra teaspoon of vanilla to intensiy the flavor.  If you have access to a vanilla bean you can do this instead: Slice open one bean, scrape out the interior, add the bean husk and scrapings to the pot as you cook the mixture, then remove the bean after the cooking is complete.

2. Candy types, such as Oreo, M&M, Reese's, etc:  Prepare the mixture as you would for Vanilla.  Right before you stop churning the mixture in your ice cream machine, add 1/2 to a full cup of your candy.  Let it mix for another 2-3 minutes.  I'd also recommend putting the candy into the fridge for at least 30 minutes before you add it to the gelato mixture.  A room temperature ingredient added to ice cream will cause it to melt a little bit.

3. Fruit where you are using the fruit - Use 1 cup of fruit.  Crush or puree 1/2 of the fruit and add it while you're cooking the mixture.  Slice the remaining fruit into small bits and add the remaining 1/2 cup just before you're done churning the ice cream.  Once again, chilling the fruit before you add it is recommended.

4.  Fruit where you're using the juice (like Lemon, Orange, etc) - During the cooking stage, add 1/2 cup of the juice.  If you're using a citrus fruit, also add 1 1/2 tablespoons of the zest while you're cooking as well.

But for today, we're going to stick to the Chocolate.  Remember to use good cocoa powder here.  The better the ingredients, the better the ice cream.

Chocolate Gelato

Makes roughly a quart and a half

1 1/2 cup whole milk
1 1/2 cup Heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup cocoa powder
5 egg yolks
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Combine the whole milk, whipping cream and salt in a medium saucepan.  Slowly stir in the cocoa powder, adding 1/4 cup at a time, until it's well combined.  Turn the heat on, medium heat that is, and stir occasionally.  Watch it slowly come up to a simmer.  While that's happening, turn your attention to eggs.

Separate out the egg yolks and pour them into a large bowl or a standing mixer's bowl.  Beat the yolks on medium high speed until they become lighter in color and frothier.  SLOWLY add the sugar to the eggs, continually mixing the two.  Once all of the sugar is incorporated, continue to mix on medium to high speed until the eggs drip off the bottom of the beater in a long ribbon.

When the milk and cream reach the simmer stage, it's time to slowly incorporate the two mixtures.  Scoop 1/8 cup of the really warm liquid out of the saucepan and slowly pour it into the egg mixture, while constantly stirring the eggs.  Repeat 4 times so the temperature of the eggs slowly increases and prevents the eggs from scrambling.

Now slowly pour the entire contents from the egg mixture into the saucepan, stirring the entire time.  Once everything is combined, cook on that medium heat and bring it back to the simmer stage.  (Don't let it get to the boiling stage.)  Remove from the heat and add the vanilla.  Pour it into a bowl with a tight lid (don't use the lid yet...) and allow it to cool on the counter for 10-15 minutes.  Put the lid on the bowl and allow to chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours.

Fire up the ice cream maker, add the chilled mixture into the bowl and freeze it according to the manufacturer's recommendations (usually 30-35 minutes on the hard serve setting).  Scoop the frozen cream back into that same bowl with a lid and drop it into the freezer for at least 2-3 hours.  Then serve any way you'd like.

If you have an extremely efficient freezer and your gelato is hard to scoop, then put the whole bowl in the microwave for 15 seconds, no more.  Since this is a fattier ice cream, it'll warm and soften just enough.  Just DON'T go any longer!

So mix up a few batches of gelato, drop them in the bowels of your freezer and save them for a very sunny day.

Broiled Parmesan Potatoes

My mom makes these absolutely delicious potato dish that goes great with almost any great barbecued item.  She boils a batch of potatoes, just like you would for a potato salad.  Then she peels them, slices them, covers them in butter, sprinkles a little cheese on top, then broils them so everything melds into one comforting mess of starchy goodness.

This is not a low fat option my any means, but the butter seeps into the slightly solid potato slices perfectly.  The crispy Parmesan on top matches well with any chicken or steak you'd pull off of the barbecue grill.  So the next time someone asks for a potato salad, try making this instead.  It's GREAT!

Broiled Parmesan Potatoes

12 medium russet potatoes
1 1/2 sticks butter
1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese (or the shakable Parmesan cheese out of the green containers)
1 1/2 tablespoons dried parsley
1 teaspoon salt
Black pepper

Bring a large stockpot of water to a boil.  Scrub your potatoes to remove all the dirt, then add them to the stockpot.  Cook for 30-40 minutes or until they are cooked all the way through.  Remove from the water and allow them to cool on a towel or cooling rack for 15 minutes.  Peel the potatoes with a knife and then slice them into small rounds.  Lay the potato rounds out in large baking dishes and fan them out like a fanned out stack of poker chips.  Melt the butter in the microwave, then pour the melted butter evenly over the potatoes, then sprinkle the Parmesan over everything.  Decorate the potatoes with the parsley and black pepper.

Move the rack in your oven to the second highest level and turn on the broiler.   Slide the potatoes under the heating elements and allow them to sit there until the Parmesan cheese begins to brown.  Remove from the broiler and serve immediately.

Cake Batter Ice Cream and visits to Cold Stone Creamery

My first time trying this little delicacy was at Cold Stone Creamery.  They started invading Salt Lake around the turn of the millennium with all the mix-ins you could ever want.  Now when I first saw this flavor, I thought, "How can you mix anything into that?  It already taste like cake."  Like I said, that was almost 12 years ago.  I've learned a lot since then.

Cake Batter is now the foundation of most of my creations over there.  Be it fruit, chocolate, candies, almost anything goes well with it.

But since I have a family of five and don't necessarily have $25 to throw down each time I get the craving, I need to make it at home.  And you can do the same!  The recipe is extremely easy and you can make a batch for about $2.25.  

Whipping Cream:  $1.25 per cup

Milk:  $0.25 per cup

Sugar:  $0.25 per cup

Cake Mix: $0.40 per half-cup (three cups in a box that costs $2.40 when it's not on sale)

Vanilla:  $0.10 per teaspoon

Total: $2.25

Make a double batch and you're out $5.00...

Yes, I am a cheapskate, I openly admit it.  But if you let the kids select a few candies from the bulk section of your local grocery store, you could make your own ice cream with specialty toppings for two adults and 3 little kids for about $8.00.  And you're not waiting in line for 20 minutes, trying to corral a 5 and 3 year old while balancing the new one on your hip.  

The other advantage of making this ice cream at home is you can make it as rich or as subtle as you'd like.  Use 1/4 cup for a lighter taste.  You can go all the way to 3/4 cup of cake mix for a richer taste.  But I'd avoid going any higher.  Using a cup or more adds too much flour and other coagulants to the mix and it starts turning into real cake batter.  And trying to freeze that properly is EXTREMELY hard.

Cake Batter Ice Cream

Makes a little over a quart.

1 1/2 cup whole milk
1 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup white cake mix

Pour the milk, whipping cream and sugar into a medium sized saucepan and stir until the sugar dissolves.  Place over medium heat and cook to a simmer.  Remove from the heat and let it set for 10-15 minute until it reaches around 110 degrees or less.  At that point, add the cake batter and whisk it into the ice cream mix.  Pour the mixture into an airtight container and chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.  It needs to be completely chilled before entering the ice cream machine.

Once it's completely chilled, pour the mixture into the running ice cream machine and freeze it according to your particular machine's instructions.  Mine says to run it on the hard serve setting for 30-35 minutes.  Once the process is complete, return the mixture to the to a chilled airtight bowl and place it in the freezer for at least 2 hours.

Garnish it with any type of topping you'd like.  Chocolate, candies, caramel, marshmallows, etc... They're all good!

So make a batch at home to beat the heat, and the long lines at the frozen marble ice cream stores.

Summer Pasta Salad for the Picnics

It's time for the family picnics and you're bound to get an assignment.  Sometimes it's completely out of your control.  Someone else could be handing out the jobs and you could be relegated to drink patrol, chip chaser or paper products. 

But if I have my choice to bring anything I want, I will choose the salad or the dessert.  Now I've got a TON of different desserts on the site already, so let's talk about a nice and easy salad that'll please almost everyone. 

My sister Robyn brought this pasta salad to one of our family dinners and it was alarmingly good.  It's blend of noodles, veggies and a little bit of protein with just a little bit of sourness from the Italian dressing marches a cavalcade of flavors across your tongue.  I'll make a large batch of this salad, divvy it up into a number of bowls and take them to work for lunch for almost a week.

What I really like about the recipe is that it doesn't take hours to make.  With a potato salad, you have to boil the eggs, boil the potatoes, let them all cool, peel them and then add them to the all of the other ingredients.  Three hours later you have a salad that's a ticking salmonella time bomb in direct sunlight on a 100 degree afternoon.  After being on the business end of one of those disasters, which caused my other business end to relegate itself to the restroom for a few hours, let's just say I'm a little anti-potato salad.

This salad... no eggs.  Matter of fact, all of your cooking occurs in one pot.  You can chop up all the veggies and cured meats while you wait for the water to boil.  You cook the noodles and blanche some of the veggies in the last minutes of the boil.  Mix everything together after the noodles are strained, add the dressing and you're done!  In less than 30 minutes, you'll have a unique salad that's light, fresh and veggie-full.

Summer Pasta Salad

Feeds 8-12 as a salad, 4-6 as a main course

1 16 ounce package rotini, farfalle or small shell pasta noodles
1 cup broccoli florettes broken into small pieces
1/2 cup diced cucumber
2/3 cup baby carrots, sliced into very small rounds
1/4 can medium black olives, sliced or 8 ounces of your favorite olives, sliced
1/4 cup finely diced red pepper
4 ounces pepperoni, cubed or sliced small
4 ounces hard salami, sliced into strips or small squares
1 cup Italian dressing or our Italian Vinaigrette

Cook the pasta according to the instructions.  While bringing the water to a boil and cooking the pasta, break the broccoli florettes into small 1/2 inch sprigs.  Rinse and dice the cucumber.  Slice all of the baby carrots to create small carrot rounds or rings.  Slice the olives into small rings.  Dice the pepperoni and the salami.

When the noodles are 2 minutes away from being done, add the broccoli, carrots and pepper into water and allow them to blanche for the remaining time. Strain and rinse the pasta and veggies with cold water to stop the cooking.  Then dump them into a large bowl.  Add the cucumber, olives and meat, then toss for about 30 seconds to mix them well.  Add the Italian dressing and continue to toss for 1 minute, so everything is thoroughly coated.  Place in the fridge and let it chill for an hour if you have it.  If you're running late, you can serve it immediately, but I like the chilled method better.


So next time you have to bring something for the party, make this salad.  Save yourself hours of prep work and receive all sorts of Kudos!

Italian Vinaigrette...be it Balsamic Red Wine, or White Wine

Next time you're at the store and need an Italian salad dressing, pick up the bottle and turn it over.  Can you pronounce everything on the label?  If you can, you're better than me.  I usually have a problem with at least two of the chemical binding ingredients.  They all have separated with the oil on the top and everything else on the bottom.  Sure, you can shake the tar out of it and it'll mix a little, but if you don't work quickly, it'll separate again and you're salad will just be oily.  Oil is lighter than water, so as more oil droplets touch each other, they have a greater tendency to float upwards out of the water and settle on top.  Oil and water just don't mix.

Or do they?

There is a technique you can employ that will force the two diametrically opposed liquids to stay suspended. We can create an emulsion.

What's an emulsion?  By definition, it is a way to vigorously mix two liquids until one is so inter-disbursed into the other that it can't separate itself from the other fluid.  In the case of a vinaigrette, we're whipping up the oil so much, that the oil goes from being one large blob into miniscule bits.  Bits so small that they can't escape the vinegar surrounding them.  Therefore, no separation.

If it was just purely oil and vinegar, there is a chance that it may separate.  To ensure that won't happen, we're going to add an emulsifier, or a small ingredient that's viscous enough to prevent the oil from grouping together an floating out.  It could be eggs (which is what's used in mayonnaise to keep it smooth) or honey.  But in our recipe, we're going to add just a little bit of dijon mustard.  We won't put in enough to alter the taste, but the chemicals inside the mustard will thicken the vinaigrette and wrap the oil droplets in a coating that will prevent them joining back up and floating to the top.

Professional chefs can whisk up an emulsion in a few minutes in a large bowl.  But me... well, I'm lazy.  So instead of enhancing any carpal tunnel issues I may have, I'm going to let my blender do the work for me.  They key is to whip the liquids with the dijon mustard for at least 1 minute.

From start to finish, this will take you three minutes to prepare and will taste much better than the bottles off the grocery store shelf.

Italian Vinaigrette

Makes about 1 1/2 cups

1 cup olive oil (light or extra virgin, your choice)
1/3 cup red wine or white wine vinegar, your choice
2 tablespoons Italian seasoning
2 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons pepper
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar (only if you want a balsamic vinaigrette)

Pour the ingredients into a blender and blend on low for 30 seconds, then on high for 30 seconds.  Pour into a serving container and pour over salads or use in a marinade.  Store in a cool dry place and use within two weeks.

See, simple and fast.  You've got enough dressing for the family, or more than enough for spicing up a pasta salad.

So forget the bottled stuff at the store and make your own in a few minutes at home.

Tequila Lime Chicken

So here's a little Mexican recipe that I wasn't able to fit in during our month of Mexican meals.  It more relevant now anyway since we're in the prime grilling season.  This is a perfect meal for a hot July afternoon where you don't want to cook a whole meal indoors.

I know that we've done a lot of marinades, rubs and brines on our recipes.  But there's a reason for that, especially when you're cooking chicken on the barbecue grill.  Soaking meat in a marinade or a brine is a great way to infuse more moisture into the meat.  It all goes back to your science classes in junior high school and osmosis.  Whenever the amount of salt and water is higher on one side of a membrane, salt and water will migrate through the membrane to equalize itself.  Conveniently, some of the flavors will come along for the ride.

When you're cooking on the barbecue, you need as much moisture in the meat as possible.  Cooking over charcoal or an open gas flame is very hot and extremely dry, so a large amount of moisture will naturally disappear.  Any extra moisture you can sink into the meat will help it stay juicy and flavorful, instead of burned and tinder-like.

This particular marinade has a great flavor with the spiciness of the chili powder and cumin, the sourness of the lime, and the richness of the GOOD tequila.  Yes, I said GOOD tequila.  Don't just buy the cheap stuff.  Remember the first rule of cooking with alcohol: Don't cook with alcohol you won't drink.  For those of you tea-totalers, don't worry about getting drunk off the chicken.  We're using roughly 3 shots worth of alcohol in this marinade and even if you soaked the breasts for a whole day, the breasts may take on 1 shot combined.   So each of the breasts will have that great tequila-lime flavor and about 1/4 of a shot of alcohol, just slightly more than a virgin margarita.  And any alcohol on the surface of the meat will evaporate during the cooking process.

Tequila Lime Chicken

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts or thighs


Marinade
1/2 cup tequila
Juice from 4 limes
1 1/2 teaspoons lime zest
2 tablespoons vegetable or canola oil
2 cloves garlic, minced fine
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
2 teaspoons chopped cilantro



We're following our marinading steps again.  Add all of the marinade ingredients into a gallon ziploc bag and shake or squish it to mix well.  Add the chicken breasts, re-seal and shake or squish to coat the meat.  Place that bag into another ziploc bag or a large container to prevent any unexpected spills and return it to the fridge.  Allow it to soak for 4 hours, all day or even overnight is even better.

Fire up the barbecue and set the burners to medium.   You can also place a skillet over your stove set on medium and allow the pan to heat thouroughly.  Place the chicken on the cooking surface for about 5 minutes.  Flip and cook on the other side until the internal temperature reaches 165 degrees.  Remove from the heat and allow them to cool for 5-10 minutes so the juices can relocate and stay in the meat, instead of your plate if you cut them too soon.

Serve with Spanish rice, black beans beans, some salsa and other garnishes.