Potato Casserole, Eenie Meenie Style, + Grilled Asparagus & Pumpkin Pie

One more barbecue to wrap up the Memorial Weekend.  We had two New York steaks to grill, plus some asparagus.  I had intended to do a potato recipe I've been wanting to try, but then I read about Eenie Meenie's (aka Rebecca) potatoes on the Big Green Egg forum and decided I needed to do those instead.  And I got to use the mandoline, which I haven't used in a while.  It's always kind of exciting to use it--will I or won't I walk away with all my skin intact?  Just kidding.  It has a safety guard on it and unless I do something really stupid, it's pretty safe.  It's always a good idea, though, just to be on the safe side, to save the drinking for after all the mandolining has been done!

Here is how to make the potatoes in Eenie's own words:

Basically, rub garlic around a pan ( I usually use ceramic or Pyrex), then smear bottom and sides with olive oil.  Thinly slice potatoes (use a mandoline if you have one) about an 1/8 of an inch or slightly more.  Then rinse them and dry them (it would be better to not rinse them then to not have them dry).  Then very thinly slice an onion (I use a sweet onion).  If it's a large diameter onion, then further cut up the round rings so that they are about two to two and a half inches.  Slice some tomatoes about 1/4 inch thick and salt them and set them aside to drain. If you do not have ripe and tasty tomatoes you can drain some canned tomatoes.....drain them well.  Remove any seeds. If they are whole tomatoes, just break them up with your hands or cut with scissors into big chunks.  Chop up some fresh basil, parsley, and oregano (mostly basil and parsley, just a little oregano) and set aside. Mince some garlic and set aside..

In a ceramic or Pyrex, or baking dish, layer a layer of overlapping potatoes, then a layer of tomatoes, then a layer of onions.  Then sprinkle on some chopped basil, parsley, garlic, oregano and salt and pepper. Repeat this entire process one or two more times depending upon the depth of your baking dish.  Don't worry if it goes to the top.....it will shrink down considerably.

Top with several pats of butter, then top with foil.  Bake at around 350 or so for an hour to an hour and a half (until the potatoes are almost done.  Then top with shredded mozzarella until it is melted.  If it doesn't brown, then place it under the broiler. 

It is important not to serve this immediately......the potatoes need to soak up some of the juices.  Let it rest for about 15 - 20 minutes or whatever. 

Basically use the herbs you like and the proportions you like.  I go heavy on the basil and parsley and light on the oregano.

This can be made ahead of time, up until the cheese part and refrigerated.  Let it warm up almost to room temp, then reheat.  After it is reheated, top with cheese.

Here's a link to the post, if that's of any help.

If you have any flavored oils, now's a good time to break them out.  I used this on the inside of the casserole after I rubbed it with garlic.

 First layer of sliced potatoes.

 Then the onions.

 Tomatoes are next.

 Then the chopped herbs.  I didn't have any oregano, so I used parsley, basil, and thyme.

I had a wee bit of Kerrygold herb butter, so I used that to dot over the layers.  This was 1 tablespoon worth.

I used two potatoes, three tomatoes, and one onion.  I would have liked more onion, but only had the one on hand.  I did two layers since it was just myself and Jim.  Also, I used a ceramic casserole with a lid and I cooked them on the BGE instead of in an oven.

I forgot to get mozarella cheese, so I used a combination of cheddar, Parmesan, and goat cheese.  It was really good.  Jim loved it.

While the potatoes were resting, we grilled the steaks at 275 degrees for 15 minutes, then flipped them and laid some sliced mushrooms on top.  Finished off grilling until they registered 135 on the Thermapen, which was another 5 to 10 minutes.

We put the asparagus on at the same time as the steaks, but pulled the asparagus when it was finished.  After peeling the asparagus and snapping off the tough ends, I tossed it in my flavored oil, sprinkled on some salt and pepper, and put it in the grill pan.  I love roasted veggies and grilling them is even better.

 This is my handy-dandy asparagus peeler.  It's one of my favorite kitchen tools because it makes peeling asparagus so easy.  It looks pretty innocent laying there on the cutting board, but it's actually quite wicked!

 In the grill pan and on the Egg.  For best texture, grill at a hot temp so it gets very roasted without getting mushy.

We decided that we were not fans of New York steak.  They were cooked perfectly with just the right amount of pink, but they were still tough and blah tasting.  Buddy lucked out because he got most of both our steaks!

The asparagus was my favorite part followed closely by the potatoes.  Dessert was also tasty.  We ended the meal with a pumpkin pie.  Jim accidentally bought a can of pumpkin pie filling instead of regular pumpkin (Buddy is on a doggy diet and pumpkin is great for dogs trying to shed a few pounds), and I opened it up without looking at the label, so we needed to get it used up.  I'll be putting up a full-on pie tutorial in the very near future, but here's the recipe I used for this pie:

Pumpkin Pie

Crust
2-1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon kosher salt
6 tablespoons leaf lard
9 tablespoons European-style butter
8 tablespoons water

Filling
2 cups pumpkin pie filling
1 cup coconut milk
3 beaten eggs
extra spices - allspice, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg

Preheat the oven to 425.  When you put the pie in the oven, turn the heat down to 375.  Bake for 50-60 minutes.  If you're baking the pie in an Aga, put it on the floor of the roasting oven for 15 minutes.  Then move to the top rung of the baking oven for 45 minutes.  Pie perfection!

Mix the dough so that the butter bits vary in size.

I found this little 'cheater' thing a few years ago.  You put the floured dough inside this pouch, zip it up, and roll it out.  It makes it almost perfectly round.  It's small, though, and so I have to then remove the dough and roll it larger.  If you have a french rolling pin, which I do not, you can achieve a very round dough without this gadget.  Still, it's a pretty fun and handy thing to have.

I like to vary how I crimp the edges.  Here I used two fingers to push pieces together and twisted it slightly to one side.

This pastry scraper is another handy tool.  If the dough sticks to your rolling surface, you can use it to scrape the dough up without tearing it.

Pie perfection!

 I'm already looking forward to a piece for breakfast tomorrow!!!

A pretty tasty dinner in remembrance of our fathers, who both were in the Navy.  My dad died back in 1980.  He was 54.  He had a heart attack in his sleep.  Jim's dad died of brain cancer in 1986, three months before our wedding.  He was 65.

On this Memorial Weekend, I am eternally grateful to all the men and women who serve and have served in the military and am very sad that so many have had to give their lives doing so.  Today my thoughts and prayers go out to all deceased and living veterans as well as their families who have also sacrificed so much for our country.

Saucy Asian Meatballs

I sure am having fun pinning all sorts of delicious-looking foods over on Pinterest.  Saturday I decided I needed to make one of the recipes I'd pinned.  So I looked through a few to decide what I was in the mood for, picked four, and then let Jim have the final say.  Being a meatball guy, he picked Saucy Asian Meatballs.

The recipe came from Gimme Some Oven, but they used quite a bit of breadcrumbs in theirs and I always cut that way back.  So here's the way I made them:

Saucy Asian Meatballs

Preheat oven to 400 degrees and have a pan ready.  I used a jelly roll pan.


Meatball Ingredients:

• 2 lbs. ground beef
• 2 tsp. sesame oil
• 1/4 cup plain breadcrumbs
• 1/2 rounded tsp. ground ginger
• 2 eggs
• 4 cloves minced garlic
• 5 thinly-sliced green onions

Mix all of the above.  I find it easier to mix everything except the beef first and then add in the beef.  But I always forget and put the meat in the bowl first.  So this time I pushed the beef off to the side and mixed the other ingredients together with a fork, and then used my hands to mix the beef in.  I had my baking pan all ready to go, so I just formed the meatballs while my hands were still yucky.


I used a cookie scoop to form the meatballs.  It was one of the Pampered Chef scoops and is about 1" in diameter.  I got 40 meatballs.  They were pretty crowded in the pan but were not touching each other.

I poured one cup of beef bouillon over the meatballs and baked them at 400 degrees for a little over 10 minutes.  I baked them on a rack at the bottom of the roasting oven for the first 10 minutes and then took the rack out and baked them directly on the floor of the roasting oven for another 3 or 4 minutes.  At that point my instant read thermometer was reading in the 155 range for all the meatballs I tested, so I pulled them out.


While they were baking,  I made the sauce.


Asian Sauce Ingredients:

• 1 jar hoisin sauce
• 1/4 cup rice vinegar
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 Tbsp. soy sauce
• 1 tsp. sesame oil
• 1 tsp. ground ginger
• 1 Tbsp. roasted sesame seeds

Boy, I love the smell of sesame oil.  I could smell that stuff all day long.  Anyway, just mix all the above together.  Very easy!  In fact, this entire recipe came together very quickly and can be made ahead, so I'll definitely be doing this one again for parties.  You can either use the sauce to dip the meatballs into or you can dress all the meatballs with the sauce and serve them over rice or noodles.  My husband had his over noodles.  I save carbs for special occasions, but if I were going to eat these over rice, I would have them over sticky rice - it would be delicious.

I'm planning a lady's luncheon in the near future and am thinking about serving chinese cicken salad.  These will be perfect as one of the appetizers.  I'm guessing you could easily make the meatballs ahead and freeze them.  Although honestly they were so easy to make, the most time-consuming thing was forming the meatballs.

Give them a try - I think you'll be pleased with them.  I couldn't stop eating them and had to take some to my co-workers at the theater just to get them out of the house!