Family Style

This was an amazing week! My wife's family (mine by osmosis) took a trip to the Poconos. Now, mind you, most of us cook. Some of us are a little more fanatical than others, but we are all to some degree proficient in the kitchen. This made for several days of borderline gluttony. Don't be offended by this. We  were all well aware of the Epicureans and the sins of overeating. We kept it just inside the lines.

The parenthetical chefs for this round of raucous mastication were as follows: Myself, Rachel (who teaches me things more often than I want to admit), Valerie (my daughter in-law who is as    obnoxious about food as I am), Bonnie (my sister in-law) & Jason (my professional pastry chef/foodie brother in-law). Needless to say, but I will anyway, we ate....and we ate well. I will be breaking this into two posts due to the shear amount of food. Lets start at the last dinner we all had together.

Country Style Ribs

Suck yer fingers ribs.

These aren't technically ribs. These are actually pork butt (and a fine butt they are), but for all intents and purposes, we'll call them ribs.

These ribs are also a little fatty. Now, some of you might have an aversion to fat. This is sad and I won't dwell too much on the reasons why you are blatantly wrong for your stupid opinion. Just know that you are and we'll drop it at that. Fat gives flavor and when it is lit from the underside by fire, becomes a thing of immense beauty that smokes the meat it is attached to.

These are so easy to make it is almost not worth talking about, but we will anyway.

1.) Par boil your ribs (butts, whatever!) This is a fine opportunity to infuse flavor. We dumped a healthy bit of Montreal Seasoning in the water and boiled until they felt firm and we couldn't see pink on the outside.

The infused boil liquid.

2.) Brush one side with BBQ sauce (I prefer Sweet Baby Rays...and you should too) and place sauce down on a hot (this is necessary) grill. Sauce the top side. Flip when the bottoms of the butts (he he he) are caramelized. Repeat three or four more times. As you do this, you ad layers of crusty, saucy goodness. Note that we went through two large bottles of sauce for the amount above on the grill. Want to see it again? I know you do.

Rachel's Roasted Asparagus w/Bacon

Sooo good. Some veggies ARE worth eating.

I said it before and I'll say it again...everything is better with bacon. Although we usually roast these sans crispy pork, we had some extra that night and opted to splurge.

1.) In a previous post I went over how to prep asparagus for eating (ie. snapping the bottom off at the first knuckle). Do so.

2.) Toss with olive oil.
3.) Squeeze some lemon juice (from a lemon, not from a bottle!) over the top.
4.) Grind some course salt on top.
5.) Top with almost cooked bacon.
6.) Broil until the asparagus is soft and wilty.
7.) Stuff in your eagerly gaping maw.

Jason's Ultimate Turtle Cheesecake

I am a bit of a cheesecake snob. While I have indulged in department store no-bakes and sad wanna-be whipped junk, I don't prefer it and certainly complain with every last bite. This one made me smile. It was different enough to make me look closely, but familiar enough to make me sigh. This was a nice end to a meal of pure comfort food.

1.) Use your favorite pre-made chocolate cookie crust. Yes I said it. This is so time saving and most of these that you get at the store are of very good quality.

2.) Pour in carmel icecream topping to cover the bottom of the crust.
3.) Cover bottom of crust with crushed pecans (the same the world around no matter how you pronounce them)
4.) Mix three packages cream cheese, three eggs, 3/4 C sugar and 1T vanilla. Beat until smooth.
5.) Pour mixture into crust.
6.) Bake in a pre-heated, 325 degree oven for an hour or hour and 10. Whenever it's set in the middle and a toothpick comes out clean, it is done.
7.) Chill. Tip: If you freeze these the topping sets better on top and it cuts MUCH easier.
8.) Top with carmel, crushed pecans and melted milk chocolate drizzles as shown.

That's it for this post. Tune in next week for part two.

As always, eat well.

Danny & Denise