More Road Trip Food

In a cooler:
dozen hard boiled eggs
celery
carrots
grapes
beef jerky
deli turkey

Not in a cooler:
macadamia nuts
avocados
oranges
apples
various lara bar types

It worked out well.

Beef Jerky - The Coffee Rub

Eye of Round, sliced thin, dry-rubbed with (proportions, approximate):
Ground Coffee (2 T)
Ground Pepper (2 T)
Ground Cumin (1 T)
Salt (1 T)
Garlic Powder (.5 T)

I'm pretty sure this is going to be spectacular.

Update 8/18/2011:  This is spectacular.  And the rub was all Triangle Girl - it works well for steaks as well.

Pesto Burgers!

Or more like pesto patties, since a burger implies some sort of bun as well, which I'd completely forgotten to consider the other people involved in the bbq.  Ah, well.

Mash together:
1 lb. ground beef
2/3 cup (or more or less) garlic scape pesto

Form into 6 patties, hand to someone else to grill.  When they magically come back perfectly cooked, combine with a salad and some grilled zucchini.  Awesome.

scooter

p.s., the inspiration came from Paleo Gurl's website.

Re-hydrating lunch test

OK - I combined some of the sausage, sweet potatoes, and veggies, covered with about 2x water, and simmered for 10-15 minutes.

Review:
It's pretty good.  I need to slice the sausages smaller, add salt and pepper.  Maybe consider adding other spices or some sort of dried base (broth) to it.  Made enough for 2 servings, but probably not 2 trail servings.

The experiment continues.....

Zucchini-Sweet Potato Patties

These are really just another version of these zucchini patties.

Grate a medium zucchini and 1/2 of a medium sweet potato.
Mix half of this together with an egg, salt, and pepper.
Grease/oil/spray a skillet over medium high heat and spread the mixture out somewhat thin.
Cook for a while on one side (several-five minutes), flip and cook on the other side.

Ate it paired with some leftover salmon and blueberries.

Go breakfast!

Chili (Paleo)

In a large pot, heat up olive oil.  Add:
1 large chopped onion.  Cook until starting to turn translucent.
Then add 1 lb. ground beef.  Cook until not pink.  Add a little bit of minced, dried garlic.
Then add 1 chopped bell pepper, and 1 chopped yellow squash.  Cook for a few minutes.
Add 1 can fire-roasted diced tomatoes, 1 can tomato sauce, a few shakes of cumin, and a few shakes of chili powder.

Simmer for 20 minutes.

Scooter

Dehydrated Stuff

More dehydrated stuff:

Tonight, I shredded about 3/4 of a peeled, uncooked sweet potato, and spread it out on a sheet for the dehydrator.  Cut out a piece of parchment paper to act as a another sheet and also did 2 trays of frozen veggies (about 16 oz. of broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots).  

Decided to try dehydrating pre-cooked chicken sausage.  It was the andouille flavored Amylu (?) brand from Costco, I sliced up 4 links, about 1/4" thick (probably should have done thinner).  I cooked them in the microwave for 1 min, just to heat them up and help release some of the fat, which I blotted with paper towels.  I then put them in a colander, and poured very hot water over them a few times (a tip I picked up off the internet for people who were drying ground beef - it should help get out even more fat).  Blot with paper towels again, throw on the dehydrator, filled up one tray.  

We'll see how this turns out - I am planning on re-hydrating for lunch at work sometime this week to test this whole theory out.  I'll probably combine all the ingredients, plus a few spices.....

Scooter

Cedar Plank Grilled Salmon

Yeah, this is where it's at.  The planks impart an awesome, smoky flavor to the salmon.

Soak a cedar plank for 1-many hours.

Heat up grill, put cedar planks on for a few minutes to pre-heat.

On salmon: squeeze lemon juice, sprinkle salt and pepper, add some fresh chopped rosemary and sage.

Leave on grill until salmon flakes with a fork, something like 30 minutes for the piece we had.

Best.  Ever.

Scooter

More Beef Jerky and Dehydrated things

Pineapple-Ginger beef jerky:

Marinate thin slices of eye of round roast in a combo of:
pineapple juice
tamari sauce
dried ginger
dried garlic
salt

Delicious!

More zucchini chips:
One medium (in the sense it's not a huge summer one, but still quite a bit larger than the ones in the store) filled two trays.  Sprinkled with salt and pepper.

Experiment, potentially leading to me attempting to make my own dehydrated camping/hiking type meals:
Take ~16 oz. of frozen veggie medley (cauliflower, carrots, broccoli)
Place them on the other two trays of the dehydrator.

Go time.  Excited to see how this turns out.

Update 8/54/11: Dried them for about 24 hours.  The frozen veggies shrank way beyond expectations, to the point where they were falling though the trays.  Next time - put down some parchment paper on the trays.  Excellent.

Roasted Tomatoes with Pesto

This recipe essentially came from Barefoot Contessa's How Easy is That?

Slice some tomatoes, arrange on a cookie sheet covered with foil.
Brush Olive Oil over them (I used Tuscan Herb Olive Oil from Mountain Town Olive Oil)
Sprinkle with ground pepper, ground salt, and some tuscan herb mix (dried)

Bake at 400 for 10-15 minutes.

Pull out of oven and smear with pesto (see recipe below)

Bake another 10-15 minutes.

P.S. - We roasted salmon, cauliflower, and the tomatoes at the same time and they were awesome!


Garlic Scape Pesto:
Big handful of basil leaves
Equal volume of garlic scapes
Glug of olive oil
small handful of walnuts

Whir in food processor!

Yummy.