Grilled Little Eggplants

Little eggplants are very similar to normal eggplants...but little. Anyways, they are really awesome on the grill. Place them directly over the coals. The idea here is to get the skin nice and charred. This is a very similar process to making roasted red peppers.
Once the skin of the eggplants are nice and charred, take them off of the grill. At this point you'll need to peel them. Many people suggest putting them into a paper bag to get them to sweat a bit. As for me, I dont have any paper bags hanging around so I just toss 'em into a bowl of cold water. Works for me.

I like to server them with brushed with a little bit of butter with the stem still on.

Charcoal Grilled Sausage Pizza

As promised earlier, this blog entry will give you yet another idea how to consume your homemade sausages.
The other night I got another itch to grill up a pizza. This time it was a homemade chicken and pork sausage ricotta cheese pie. Again, you really need to try this out. Its simple and it tastes incredible. The taste is a little different than your average pizza parlour pie because of the charcoal flavor.
Remember to get the pizza stone as hot as you can get it before transferring your dough to the stone. As a reader suggested earlier it is also possible to do the dough directly on the grill thpough its a bit mroe difficult.

Shark - Reader Submitted

Normally I would avoid kicking you all in the kiwis by having three fish type posts in a row but I received this post from a reader a while ago and am only now getting around to posting it.

"I had to try it. I saw shark steak for sale at Safeway. Shark steak sounds ... impressive.
The tag said "Only $7.99/lb - Great for grilling". So I bought a couple of the steaks and brought them home for grilling. I prepared it by simple slathering it with mustard and grilling it about 6 minutes per side. You can see the results below.

I have to say. It only tasted so so. My Fat Tire Beer tasted much better. Can anyone send me some suggestions as to how to cook Shark on a grill?

One more thing. Shark is not one of those endangered fish that we are not supposed to buy is it? "

Charcoal Grilled Anchovy Pizza

Another one of those grill "oh my god that was good" meals is grilled pizza. In a previous blog entry, one of my readers showed us how to grill a pizza on a gas grill. While pizzas on a gas grill are fantastic, pizzas on a charcoal grill are "oh my god that was good".

One of my all time favorites is anchovy pizza. And it is amazingly simple. Here is the breakdowno the steps involved:

1. Prepare your pizza dough (or buy it). Look for a good recipe on the web. I believe IHOB has one as well. Making your own dough takes a bit of time due to the yeast so plan accordingly.
2. Prepare your pizza sauce. This is simple. Start with some fresh garlic and a small onion cut into small pieces. Give them both a good fry in some olive olive oil before adding a can of crushed tomatoes. Add a bit of salt, pepper, and oregano and you have your basic pizza sauce. Feel free to add other herbs as well if you got 'em. Hint: basil makes a fine addition here.
3. Prepare your grill. Get it nice and hot. I actually use a full sleeve for this. You will also need a pizza stone of course. I bought mine at Crate and Barrel. Not all of the stones out there say they work on a charcoal grill so be careful. You also want the stone hot so put it on your grill right away to get it heated up.
4. Roll out your dough, smear some sauce on top, and then spread your favorite shredded cheese on top. of that. Then add your anchovies. There arent any rules on how you lay out the anchovies but the picture above is how I did it.
5. Next comes the only tricky part: getting the pizza on to the stone without messing it up. A pizza paddle would be your best option as this point. Its well worth the money.
6. Once your pizza is safely on to your stone cover the grill and leave all of the vents open. I cannot stress enough that you want the thing hot. If the grill is not hot enough your crust will not get crispy. 10-15 minutes should do the trick.
   

Oh yeah, if you don't like anchovies on pizza it might be a good time to move out of your parents basement and find work.

Mahi Mahi Mahi

I tend to grill a lot of salmon, so this time I decided to shake things up a bit a go for the mahi mahi. Mahi mahi, also known as dolphin fish (though not related to the mammal), goes great on the grill. Preparation is simple as well. I marinaded this fillet for about an hour in lime juice and a bit of salt.
Before placing in my grill basket I seasoned the fish with a bit more salt and pepper. Similar to salmon, you only want to cook this guy over direct heat for about 6-8 minutes a side.

For my final plating, I served some steamed broccoli, sprinkled with parmesean cheese, brown rice and a parsley humus.

Homemade Sausages

That's right, store bought aren't good enough for the BBQB. Actually, I don't go through the hassle that often but last weekend I did...and here's what went down.The first step is to grind your meat of choice. My plan was to make both some 100% chicken sausages and some 100% pork sausages. For the chicken, I used boneless, skinless thighs. Chicken thighs have a little more flavor than just chicken breasts though I guess that would work as well. As for the pork I used boneless pork chops.While grinding the chicken, I also tossed in a few cloves of fresh garlic and a handful of parsley. The parsley gives the chicken dogs a nice fresh flavor. Once the chicken is ground up, here's your chance to season it. I added plenty of salt, pepper, onion powder and garlic powder. For the pork links I also tossed in a few cloves of garlic and then spiced the mixture with salt, pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, crushed red pepper, chili powder and a pinch of cumin. Bascially spice your meat mixture to your own pallette. If you are unsure about your creation just make a small meatball and fry it up quickly and taste it.

The only tricky part in this whole operation is the actual stuffing of the casing. I bought the natural casing at my "go to" grocery store Shop Rite. Casings come frozen, packed in salt for preservation. Just slowly defrost the casings and rinse the salt off thoroughly.

Next, take a yard or so of intestines and slip them over your Kitchen Aid sausage stuffer. Be sure to also spray a little of non-stic spray into the device to make this process easier. Slowly start filling your casing being careful not to create too many air bubbles. When completely filled twist off your links in equal lengths.After a couple of hours of work, I was ready to eat. Below, on the left are a couple of my pork sausages and on the right are the chicken.
Frankly (excuse the pun) these sausages were incredible and I really think everyone should go through the headache of making these every now and then. Keep tuned to the blog and I'll show you other creative ways of using the sausages.