Grilled Mojo Chicken and Barbecue Black Beans with Rum

Tonight's dinner took forever to get made because the kids just weren't cooperating. I started preparing dinner at 4:30 and at 6:15 I had put no more than 20 minutes into it because Adeline wanted to be glued to my breast and Camille wanted to test me on everything. But we finally ate and it was well worth the wait. Plus, we'll have leftovers tomorrow, so I can sit back and relax (yeah right..) tomorrow night.

So, dinner tonight was grilled mojo chicken, barbecue black beans with rum, and brown rice. The mojo chicken recipe is from Food Made Fast: Weeknight (Williams-Sonoma), which is one of my best used cookbooks. The recipe is also available on the Williams-Sonoma website. The barbecue black beans with rum is my vegetarian version of a recipe from Cooking Light in 2000. I've been making these beans for

years and they are so delicious.

I'll start with the chicken:

Grilled Mojo Chicken

zest and juice from 2 oranges

zest and juice from 4 limes

1/2 cup fresh flat leaf parsley, minced

2 tablespoons fresh oregano, minced

3/4 teaspoon dried thyme

8 garlic cloves, minced

4 teaspoons ground cumin

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

8 (about 3 pounds) skinless, boneless chicken thighs

salt and freshly ground pepper

Combine the orange and lime zest, orange and lime juice, parsley, oregano, thyme, garlic, and cumin in a bowl large enough to fit the chicken. Whisk in the olive oil. Season the chicken with salt and pepper. Add the chicken to the marinade and stir to coat the chicken. Cover and refrigerate for 1-2 hours.

About 20 minutes before cooking the chicken, take it out of the refrigerator and allow to come to room temperature. Heat a gas grill to medium heat and oil the grill rack. Place chicken on the grill brushing marinade over the top side of the chicken. Cook, turning once until opaque throughout, about 20 minutes. Makes 8 servings

The original recipe specified grilling on high heat for less time. I prefer to cook chicken at a lower temperature for longer so it doesn't get so charred on the outside while cooking on the inside. I also recently discovered that grilling with the grill open makes meat take longer to cook, but it's less likely to overcook or burn. Yeah, I'm 35, have been cooking for years, and just figured that one out. I probably had the grill closed for a total of 4 minutes while cooking this chicken.

Barbecue Black Beans with Rum

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 vidalia onion, chopped

2 jalapeno peppers, seeded and finely chopped

6 garlic cloves, minced

1/2 cup ketchup

1/2 cup molasses

1/2 cup rum

1/4 cup dijon mustard

2 tablespoons brown sugar

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon hot sauce (optional)

3/4 teaspoon ground ginger

3 cans black beans (2 - 15-ounce cans and 1 - 26.5-ounce can)

Heat olive oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Saute onion and jalapeno for about 5 minutes until onion is softened. Add garlic and saute for 1 minute. Add next 8 ingredients (ketchup through ground ginger). Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in the black beans. Simmer over low heat for about an hour, stirring occasionally.

I like to serve these beans over brown rice as a side dish.

Grilled Flank Steak and Blood Mary Tomato Salad

This was dinner tonight and we loved it! As I ate this medium-rear steak, enjoying it thoroughly, it occurred to me that I was once a vegetarian. How funny. I'm not a huge meat-eater. I don't eat meat every day -- I just believe in a balance in my diet and I enjoy eating meat too.

Anyway, for a change, I actually followed the recipe as it was written. It's rare that this happens, but it does occasionally happen. The only one thing I did differently was to double the quantities for the bloody mary tomato salad. I like a lot of vegetables and I didn't feel like making another vegetable dish.

So, this entry is easy tonight. The recipe is on the bon appetit website. I'll definitely be making this again!

Orange-Poppy Seed Muffins

I made these muffins on Sunday and they were quite good. I think I might prefer lemon-poppy seed muffins, but I'm not sure. These had a delicious orange glaze that I drizzled over the top and I'm not sure you can go wrong with a little burst of sugar. If this recipe was available online, I'd share it, but since it isn't, I can't. It's from Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Baking: Recipes and Techniques for Succcessful Home Baking, which is a very good cookbook. Even though some of the recipes from this cookbook are available online, I'd still say it's been worthwhile for me to own. For starters, I really enjoy browsing through cookbooks and magazines to find recipes to try. The other reason it's been useful is that I think it wasn't until I got this cookbook that I really understood the meaning of soft peaks and stiff peaks with respect to beating egg whites.

One thing to note with this recipe is that I think there's a typo either in the written instructions or the ingredient list. The amount of orange juice in the ingredient list is 1/2 cup and in the written instructions it's 1/4 cup. I used 1/4 cup and the muffins were good, so if I make these again, I'll stick with 1/4 cup.

Minted Lemonade

I didn't bother taking a picture of this lemonade because it's pretty easy to visualize lemonade. My first attempt at making this had too much lemon flavor and not enough mint flavor. Today was my second attempt and it came out really well. I still may experiment a little more, but this was really good so I thought I'd share it. Here it is:

Lemonade

1 cup lemon juice (about 4 jumbo lemons)

2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh mint

3 cups boiling water

3/4 cup lemon and mint syrup

Put the fresh mint in a bowl and add 3 cups boiling (or nearly boiling) water. Let steep for 5-10 minutes. Pour into a pitcher straining the mint leaves out. Add the lemon juice and syrup. Refrigerate and serve cold with ice. Garnish with a lemon slice and small mint sprig. Makes about 4 large glasses full.

Note: I really like tart lemonade. For sweeter lemonade add more syrup until you reach your desired sweetness.

Lemon and Mint Syrup

2 cups sugar

1 cup water

zest from 2 large lemons

2 tablespoons chopped mint

Combine all ingredients. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Let simmer for 5 minutes. Strain out the solids. Store in the refrigerator. Makes about 1 3/4 cups.

I think a simple syrup of just sugar and water might work just fine. I like the idea of infusing some of the same flavors into the sweetener so as not to dilute the flavor at all.

White Bean and Swiss Chard Soup

David and Camille had colds earlier this week, so I decided to make soup for dinner. Only problem is that I then got really sick with mastitis and landed myself in the hospital for a day and a half, so I didn't end up making this until David was feeling better. Anyway, this soup is not super-exciting to look at, but it was surprisingly quite delicious. The original recipe is from The Williams-Sonoma Collection: Soup and can be found on the Williams-Sonoma website. Here's my version:

1 1/4 cup Great Northern beans, soaked for 4 hours

3 tablespoons olive oil

2 vidalia onions, coarsely chopped

4 carrots, peeled and sliced

1 large bunch Swiss chard, stems removed, cut into thin strips

6 cups low sodium chicken stock

1 14.5-ounce can diced tomatoes

1/2 cup fresh basil, finely chopped

6 cloves garlic, minced

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

3/4 cup mini fusilli

4 tablespoons fresh parsley, finely chopped

Grated pecorino romano cheese

In a large soup pot over medium heat, warm the oil. Add the onions and saute, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 5 minutes. Add the carrots and saute for about 3 minutes. Add two-thirds of the Swiss chard and saute until wilted, about 2 minutes. Add the stock, beans, tomatoes, basil, and garlic and simmer, partially covered, until the beans are tender, about an hour. Remove from heat.

Meanwhile, in a pot of salted boiling water, cook the pasta until al dente, about 3 minutes. Drain in a colander and set aside.

Using a blender, puree about 2/3 of the soup in batches leaving the remaining 1/3 for texture. Return the soup to the pot. Heat the soup on medium-high heat and add the cooked pasta, about 2 tablespoons of the parsley, and remaining Swiss chard. Cook until the chard is wilted but retains its color, about 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Ladle the soup into bowls and sprinkle parsley and romano cheese on top. 6 servings.

Grilled Watermelon Salad

I just made this tonight and it was really good. It's from this month's Bon Appetit. I made a few changes, as usual, mostly because of what ingredients I had available and the time I had available. I couldn't get queso fresco at my grocery store, so I used feta instead. I didn't want to take the time to make the basil olive oil, so I didn't. And I don't like radishes that much, and it would have been days before they were pickled, so I left those out too. Here's my version of the grilled watermelon salad:

1/3 cup plus 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon fresh basil, finely chopped

3 1/2-inch thick slices seedless watermelon, rind

removed, each cut into 6 wedges for a total of 18

wedges

1/4 cup fresh lime juice

1 tablespoon honey

1 4-ounce bag of watercress

1/2 cup mild feta cheese

1/4 cup pumpkin seeds, toasted

Heat a gas grill to medium. Brush each side of each watermelon wedge with olive olive and grill about 2 minutes per side. Set aside.

Whisk remaining 1/2 cup oil, basil, lime juice, and honey in a small bowl until well blended. Toss the watercress with the dressing in a large bowl.

Divide the watercress into 4 bowls. Add 3-4 wedges of watermelon to each bowl. Sprinkle 1/4 of the feta cheese and 1/4 of the toasted pumpkin seeds over each bowl. Serves 4.

Grilled Halloumi with Watermelon and Mint Oil

The latest issue of Bon Appetit is the grilling issue and it is fantastic. I had already bought some mint and a watermelon, and I actually found Halloumi cheese at my grocery store, so I decided to make this to go with our dinner of grilled filet mignon and grilled watermelon salad. The original recipe is available online. Here's my slightly altered version:

1 tablespoon coarsely chopped fresh basil

3 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh mint

1 garlic clove, coarsely chopped

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper

1 8-9 ounce package Halloumi cheese, cut into 8 slices

8 triangles thinly sliced watermelon, rind removed

Heat a gas grill to medium-high. Pulse the basil, mint, and garlic in a food processor. Add the oil to the food processor and process until well blended. Set a strainer over a small bowl; strain, pressing on solids. Season with salt and pepper.

Toss the cheese in 2 tablespoons of the oil. Grill the cheese until charred in spots and beginning to melt, about a minute on each side.

Arrange the melon on a platter. Top each wedge with a slice of cheese. Drizzle with the remaining oil. 4 servings.

If I make this for guests I'll be using some fresh mint for garnish.