Brats in Beer with Sauerkraut

Grill season is in full swing. What's your favorite thing to grill?

I can never choose. Anytime I fire up the coals, the kids usually want burgers & dogs. But I usually want to grill some chicken or steak or veggies or pork or shrimp... See my problem? I can't choose!! So typically, the minimum that ends up on my grill is burgers & dogs, plus at least one other protein.

One Jon's often requested grilled foods is Brats.


I didn't grow up eating these and honestly, I'm not a big fan. I'm not really sure how or why I started making them like this.

But Jon & our friends seem to really like them!

Brats in Beer with Sauerkraut
Brats
Sauerkraut, mostly drained
Beer
Onion, sliced
salt & pepper
Sausage Rolls (nice ones!)
Mustard (the good stuff!!)
Mayo (if you like)

Make a bed of sauerkraut in the bottom of a grill-safe pan.
Top with some sliced onions, then brats.
Top brats with more sauerkraut & sliced onions.
Sprinkle with a little salt & pepper.
Cover with beer.
Let that rest in the fridge for awhile (until the coals are ready)
Put the pan on the grill. If the beer is boiling too much... move it to a cooler part of the grill, so it doesn't totally boil off. Simmer for about 30 minutes. Pull the brats out of the sauerkraut and place them on the grill to get some nice grill marks on them. Serve them in a sausage roll that has really good mustard and mayo in it... add some of the sauerkraut & onions and enjoy!



I like to use little foil loaf pans for this. They each hold two brats plus kraut nicely.




Ok... looks like I added the beer before topping with kraut... but in hindsight... adding the beer last would be better!




Now to get the coals ready.

That's Jon's job. I hate to do it and I'm not very good at it. It takes me forever!

Coals are ready... on to the grill they go!


They are sharing the grill with some Ranch Turkey Burgers.

Steamy...


Ok... ready for some grill marks.

I moved them to the other grill... because that's where I had room!


One opened up a bit...


Time to get the sausage rolls ready.

Jon prefers Mr. Mustard for his brats... and he like mayo too.








That's it! Ready to eat!


That probably would have looked a little better cut in half! But I assure you... if you love brats... you'll love them like this!

Grilled Citrus Chicken

Mmm.... isn't that beautiful?



A few weeks back I was dying for something 'fresh'.

On the dinner thread over at BakeSpace I was looking for "some kinda citrusy/orangy/not too orangy/fresh/garlicy" marinade for chicken.

Matt74 offered up his Citrusy Marinade for chicken and it looked great!!

I changed it a little...

Matt74's Citrus Marinade
1 tbls each of lemon,lime,and orange zest
1 tbls each of the juice
I added more OJ
2 shallots minced
4 cloves garlic minced
2 tbls good Dijon mustard
I replaced the Dijon with Soy Sauce
1/3 cup olive oil
1 1/2 tbls honey
2 tbls fresh thyme minced fine
salt and pepper to taste

Throw everything in a jar or whisk together put in a ziploc and marinate at least 2 hrs.

I didn't have two hours... so I put in my FoodSaver in the fridge for an hour.

Matt74's dinners always sound amazing!! Check out more of his recipes HERE.

Everything into my 2.25 qt FoodSaver container.


Plus chicken cutlets.


I mix it around really good with my hands to be sure everything gets well covered.


Vacuum seal and into the fridge for an hour.


Fast forward 60 minutes...

Slap those babies on the grill. I only have a charcoal grill and while 60 minutes of marinating time is plenty to get the coals ready, it's extremely rare for me to use the outside grill on a work night.

So cast iron grill it is.



How gorgeous is THAT??




Add some rice and snap peas and it's dinner time!!


This recipe is DEFINITELY a keeper! All of the fresh citrus zest, plus the garlic, gave this chicken just the fresh zippy flavor I was looking for!

Thanks Matt!!

Chicken Souvlaki

I mentioned before that we're trying to lighten up at my house.

We've been grilling a lot of chicken.

This looked like a tasty recipe from Cooking Light, so I tried it out a week or so ago. I tweaked most of the quantities, but the ingredients are mostly the same.



Chicken Souvlaki
2 - 3 lbs skinless chicken breast, cut into 1 inch pieces
6 TBLS lemon juice
1 TBLS fresh oregano, chopped
1 TBLS olive oil
6 cloves garlic, minced

Combine lemon juice, oregano, olive oil and garlic in a large plastic ziplock bag.
Add chicken pieces.
Squish it around so the marinade really gets to all of the pieces of chicken.
Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
If you're using wooden skewers, they need to soak for 30 minutes in water.
Thread the chicken onto the skewers and grill about 8 minutes, turning the skewers as they cook.

You can find my Tzatziki Recipe HERE.

Fresh lemon juice makes such a difference.


But bottled is fine, if that's all you have.
(it's often all I have!)

And again... I can't help but smile when I go to my herb garden to fetch herbs for whatever I happen to be putting together.




Mix the lemon juice, oregano, olive oil, and garlic in a plastic bag.

As you can see... I dirtied a bowl by mistake!




Now add the chicken to the bag and squish it around so it's all mixed up really well.


Pop that into the fridge for 30 minutes.

Then thread them onto skewers.


Obviously, feel free to add veggies between the chickens if you like.

If I was just serving the shish kabobs, I would have added veggies. But I was serving them in flat bread... and I always stuff them too full!

Now it's grillin' time!

Only charcoal at my house!

I AM the grill master! Ok... just the grill master at my house.

But for YEARS the grill was very intimidating to me. Then we went to a Cinco de Mayo party a few years ago, at the house of one of Jon's former band mates and I watched Steve grill all day. He truly IS a grill master! Something clicked that day. Suddenly it wasn't intimidating anymore. And I do pretty well!

Anywayyyy.....

Throw those shish kabobs on the grill.




Oh yeah!


Slather your favorite flat bread with Tzatziki Sauce and some lettuce, tomatoes and onions. (or whatever you like on a sammie)


Add some of that gorgeous grilled chicken.


Fold it up and it's time to eat!!!


The chicken tastes so fresh marinated in the lemon juice with oregano and garlic.


So delicious with the tangy, creamy (and entirely fat free) Tzatziki Sauce you forget it's totally figure friendly!

Chicken Fajitas ~ Why didn't I consider them blog worthy??

It was a very quiet lazy weekend around Casa de Spryte this weekend. The first weekend in at least a month that we didn't have any company.

I do LOVE having company, but it was so nice to have nothing to do at all.

So, as often happens on lazy Sundays, time just slips away and before you know it... it's dinner time.

Early in the day, Jon & I had decided to grill chicken since it was forecast to be a dry and sunny.

It was 5:15ish and I said, "Why don't you start the charcoal at 5:30?" At about 5:25, I get the "Mom, can you pick me up?" call. UGH! Tawny needed a ride halfway home from work. Weekend bus schedules often leave you waiting almost an hour for your connection, so I picked her up. She wouldn't be to the connection point until 6:13. I told Jon to hold off on the coals until around 6... lost a few more games of Mahjong on my DS and left to go pick up Tawny.

When got home, Jon had the chimneys filled with charcoal and getting hot. It was close to 7 before I actually started to grill.... then I remembered I wanted to grill some onions & peppers too, and make some guacamole so we could have chicken tacos.

Tacos, burritos, nachos... to me they're kind of all the same... mostly the same ingredients, prepared mostly the same, just put together differently for eating. Also, this is the kind of stuff we eat my house regularly. How many posts of basically the same nature do you want to see?

So I figured... chicken tacos... nah... I won't blog about it... just more of the same.

I was wrong.

The chicken tacos turned into chicken fajitas (yeah, still kinda more of the same, I know)

But they were AMAZING!

Again I used Tyler Florence's Mojo Marinade and ended up with a big pile of chicken like this.


I also had some onions & peppers drizzled with olive oil on the grill in a little basket. I can't find any previous of pics... so you'll just have to use your imagination... are you doing it? Can you smell the onion & peppers on the charcoal grill??

Of course I had to whip up a fresh batch of guacamole. I like my guacamole really basic... just avocado, onion, lime juice & salt.


Gorgeous sliced grilled chicken, into a warm soft flour tortilla, topped with smokey grilled onions and peppers, shredded colby-jack cheese, fresh creamy guacamole, and some chunky garden salsa.

Do I have a picture? No.

I ate mine standing over the sink.

It was so good.

You know when you take that first bite and your eyes roll back in your head a little... and your whole body says, "mmmmmmmmmmmm"?

It was that good. It was as good or better than any chicken fajita I've eaten from a sizzling skillet in any TexMex restaurant.

For some reason, beforehand, I didn't consider it blog-worthy.

Was I ever wrong!!