March Madness Becomes April Foolishness

So folks, March is over and I failed miserably to keep up with my March madness pledge of eating and photographing a different dinner every night. I apologize but the madness has not left my soul.

Today I am announcing the first ever April Foolishness held here at WhiteTrash BBQ. The rules are pretty simple. I challenge myself to eat a different dinner each night for the entire month of April. I will photograph it whenever it seems interesting enough to document.

Here's the run down so far...

• April 1 - Grilled beef spiedinis with rice pilaf and sugar snap peas. Hey, I lit a fire!
• April 2 - Potato gnocchi with basil pesto sauce and grilled Cajun shrimp. Lenten Friday.
  
• April 3 - Perdue Fun Shape Chicken Nuggets, Tater Tots and corn. Not exactly the plan for dinner as I lit a fire that morning. I barbecued a beef brisket, more on that later.
  
• April 4 - Easter dinner! Oven roasted leg of lamb with garlic and rosemary, mashed potatoes, string beans, corn and a new dish for my vegetarian son; barley-spiked winter vegetable casserole from the cookbook The Vegetarian Slow Cooker by Judith Finlayson.

I was glad to get the opportunity to review the Vegetarian Slow Cooker for a couple of reasons. We've had a crock pot for years and it has sat unused in the cellar until this book arrived. The pot was one of those things that survives every attempt at clearing out the cellar with the comment, "Oh, we'll use it someday." Finally "someday" arrived. The other reason to be honest was that I've been having a difficult time coming up with new, exciting and interesting meals for my son. Vegetables have always played second fiddle on my table.

The Vegetarian Slow Cooker has really expanded my horizons. I highly recommend it. We, my son and I, have made a few recipes from this book and so far, they've all been winners.

Damn kids.

Well, Rachael Ray's Surf and Turf Tacos called for the steak and fish to be sauted in a pan. Well, I couldn't allow that. So with my brother and daughter's help, we dragged out a grill to properly cook this meat - over a charcoal fire!

But, before we began to cook, my brother informed me that the 1 1/2 lbs of red snapper fillets and 1 1/2 lbs of skirt steak wasn't enough protein for 6 adults. "Huh?", says I. "3 lbs of usable meat isn't enough? With the side dishes 3 lbs isn't enough?" "Nope," says he and we're off to the butcher for more.

But, wait a minute, my son who has become delusional again and joined the cult of vegetarianism. Again. "Pop - what are you making for me?" "There's black beans, rice, lettuce, cabbage, cheese, sour cream, tortillas, tomatoes and peppers," I tell him. "Can you grill some portabello mushrooms too?" "OK," I say. "I had beans yesterday. Can you make me Tofu?" asks my son.

Tofu? Tofu? TOFU? The ultimate non meat and to me, non food. The carnivores nemesis. That strange white sponge that vegetarians seem to love and insist on ingesting. I'd rather use it to clean the sink. "OK," I tell him, "but how do you make it?" "Grill it," he tells me. GRILL IT? My beloved son wants me to defile one of my grills, my babies who will be with me long after he's left home, married and with kids of his own with TOFU? Ugh.

So, after some persuading from the boy and his mother, "Do it for me, it's mother's day after all." I relent and check the internet for some grilled tofu recipes. Let me tell you there ain't many. (Anybody looking for a cookbook idea, there you have it. I'd do it, but I'd have to taste test the recipes and that ain't gonna happen.) I settle on a marinade of lemon juice, fresh oregano, olive oil, garlic and salt and pepper.

So after the meat, fish, peppers, tortillas and mushrooms were all grilled, I gently settled the tofu on my grill as a single tear left my eye.

My son said it was good. What wouldn't we do for our children? Happy belated Mother's Day.

Photo of the grilled sponge, I mean tofu comes from I Am Gluten Free which is a great resource for anyone celiac disease. Check it out.

The Vegetarian Barbeque

I hear the screams. Relax guys and girls, I'm not about to give up my meat eating ways. I enjoy being on top of the food chain.

Being in New York City, I run into all kinds and there are a lot of vegetarians living in the concrete jungle. As much as I don't comprehend their lifestyle, many veg heads don't understand or approve of mine.

I'll never understand why so many vegetarians work so hard to create meat substitutes. I'm talking about things like the faux chicken fingers, burgers, meat balls etc. I remember one visit to an animal rescue center upstate that included a vegetarian lunch. The chef was so proud of her "meatless chicken salad." She swore up and down that once you tried it you'd never go back to chicken. I tried it and well, whatever it was it was no substitute for chicken salad. It didn't taste like it, it didn't smell like it and it didn't look like it. I'm not saying it wasn't tasty, because it was pretty good. But I think my mind and palate would have approved more if she called it what it really was.

If it's a chopped nut and wheat berry salad- say so. Don't try to pass vegetables off as something else. You'll never find a carnivore trying to pass pulled pork shoulder off as spaghetti squash.

Let's stop the vegetarian bashing; this is a blog about barbecue. Towards that end I want to point out The Vegetarian Barbeque. It's a website based in Australia, who almost gets the concept of vegetables are vegetables and meat is meat. It's got some great vegetarian recipes, most of which don't try to pass off tofu as meat. Enjoy.

Photo courtesy of The Vegetarian Barbeque