Grillin' in the Heat

Happy Monday everyone!

This weekend I was determined to top my simple chicken and salad meal from two weeks ago. I was the crazy person who decided to grill in the 90 degree heat this past Sunday (face-> palm).  I wanted to really beef (no pun intended) up my meal so I decided to make chicken and beef kabobs. What I did not realize was how long this whole process would take, but in the end the food was delicious!

My parents told me they would make this essentially from scratch all the time, so I decided to give it a try. First I began by cubing the chicken and beef. Man is there a lot of excess fat on the beef! I had to cut all the fat off and felt like there was no beef left! After I was done cutting the meat, I moved on to making the marinade. Sure this meal would have been fine simply being marinaded with Italian dressing, but my dad has a wonderful kabob marinade, so I decided to try that! After mixing the vegetable oil, soy sauce, lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, garlic and pepper in a plastic Ziploc bag, I added the meat, also. I made sure to really toss the bag around to make sure the meats were covered in marinade before putting it in the fridge for about 5 hours.

Later in the day I began to cut up the vegetables. This consisted of green pepper, red pepper, onion and mushrooms. My dad had to step in and cut the onions though because I wasn't up for crying! I made sure to cut the veggies into thicker pieces so they would grill well and stay on the skewer better. I decided to make meat skewers and vegetable skewers because my parents mentioned the vegetables seemed to cook a lot faster than the meat. My mom asked me if I needed help while I was cooking so she made some rice to go on the side. Thanks Mom!

Now this is the part I wasn't ready for; the amount of time it took to grill. I was also the dummy who decided to grill in 30mph winds on a 90 degree day! Overall it took about 15 -20 minutes, with some taste testing to see how close they were to being done. At this point I was impatient and sweaty and vouched to never grill in that type of heat again. Even though I say that, the kabobs turned out to be wonderful.

Before eating I was in need of pouring myself a refreshment. I paired this meal with the Cooper's Hawk White Sangria. I chose this wine because with the meat and vegetables being grilled and more of a salty flavor, I wanted to pair it with something a little more sweet. I'm sure a red wine would have also gone well with this, but the white sure went down just fine!

We also decided to pull out different sauces to put with our rice and kabobs. I found it best to just be to mix up all the pieces so they all caught some of each others flavors. Here is a picture of the finished product!

After completing this meal, I felt much more accomplished than last time. As school and chaos is approaching quickly, I am looking for some quick, yet delicious, meals to make on weeknights. Do you have a favorite weeknight recipe that you are willing to share? Please post if you do!

Bon appétit!!