Weekend Update : RELAXING!

I had a fantastic weekend, I hope you did too!

Here's the rundown:

Saturday I woke up, got my food ready for the Stamp Out Hunger food drive.  It was super easy, they give you an empty bag a few days in advance, you fill it with good dated non perishables, and then set it out on the day selected, and the postal workers pick it up! 

How easy!  Anyways, so I did that, and then went to the gym, hung out on the Dreadmill for a bit, came home, showered, grabbed the hubster and went to the Minneapolis Farmer's Market to pick up some plants for our garden.  I ended up putting them in the window sill until later this week, because it is supposed to freeze tonight(and then warm up to 90!).

While we were there we saw this guy that we had met a couple years ago giving away sample tastes of Mean Green at our local Cub Foods.  We ended up buying 2 bottles.  He has you try it on a piece of french bread, and I swear, I would be just fine the Mean Green like that.

While we were at the Farmer's Market it was frozen raining on us for a brief moment.  Where they would have been rain drops, except that they froze, and never thawed by the time they landed on Earth.

After that we came home, unloaded our stuff, I tried to take a nap, the Hubster went and got a haircut, called me up, and we headed to Menards to pick up some stuff to add to the soil since ours gets so dry and crumbly.  We also ended up picking up a cheap table and chair set for our deck, since I really like to eat outside, it is basically a necessity.

After Menards we went out to eat at the Lone Spur Bar and Grill, where I had a Coronarita!  I at first only ordered a water, however the Hubster was upset that I wasn't drinking.  (what a weirdo)

The drink was only $10. But think about it.  It's a margarita, and a 12 oz. beer.  The Hubster's 2 beers were $12 or something.

Then we napped.  Well, I basically went to bed for the night, he napped, and watched NASCAR. Gross.  Glad I slept through that.

Sunday we woke up, and I scooted over to Caribou for their BOGO offer for Mother's Day.  When I got back the Hubster was washing dishes. He sat down with me to finish watching CBS Sunday Morning, and then we started moving around. 

We finished up the dishes, then moved outside to the deck to take care of the climbing vines from last year's Morning Glory's, 4 o'clocks and Moon Flowers.  And to set up our new deck set.  We grilled Corn on the cob (in it's husk) from the Market, potatoes and chicken.  

It was a particularly lovely day! 

How was your weekend?!

Dinner : Sriracha Burgers and Potato Wedges

When I was looking ahead at the weather forecast for the week, I knew I needed to get out and use the grill Monday.  The rest of the week has the possibility of either - turning very cold, or maintaining Spring. 

I hope it can maintain!!  We have had a very long, cold, and particularly snowy April.  I am hoping that May will be the warmth that everyone knows and loves.  Especially since we will be camping at the end of the month for Memorial Day.

Monday's lunch was pretty disappointing from the cafeteria.  It consisted of stir fry veggies, a piece of grilled chicken (like, a slice of it) soggy rice, and peanut sauce.  I put more Sriracha sauce on it to give it a little extra kick. And am I ever glad I did.  If you have read a few of my past posts, you may have seen my posting on Poor Man's Pad Thai that I was making for lunch for a month, for no other reason than I LOVED it.

But that got me thinking,

1. I needed to figure out dinner
2. We should use the grill tonight
3. There is ground beef in the fridge that needs to be used
4. I love Sriracha!

So I came up with this brilliant idea of Sriracha Burgers!  Knowing I am not the most ingenious person in the world, I knew I could google it and find something that would work.

The results I came up with ended up leading to The Sriracha Cookbook.  Which I should probably own. I decided to use the Serious Eats Ultimate Sriracha Burger recipe.  I followed the recipe pretty much, I posted the recipe here too.

And while I was floating for a recipe for the burgers, I knew I wanted to make 'oven fries' on the grill, and came across Serious Eats for Grilled Potato Wedges - sounds good to me!  I made a couple of changes to the Potato Wedges, my version can be found here.

One of the number one things I would say, is you should ALWAYS set up a topping station, for anything that requires assembly.  You can see in my photo the bacon slices, onions, tomato slices, blue cheese-Sriracha sauce and the Arugula, waiting patiently for the burgers to finish.

All we did was put a slice of cheese on the burgers and let it sit on the grill an extra minute, and then put them on the buns.  I was eating a Pepperidge Farm Deli Flat. Not the same as a beautiful hamburger bun, but with the average calorie count for the burger being at about 780, I needed to cut corners somewhere.

There she is in all her glory. She was super tasty!  I really liked the extra bite the Sriracha gave the burger, and the sauce? That was so delicious that I needed to dip some of our slightly over done potato wedges in.

I let the hubster do the grilling, I mean, I did buy him the grill.  However, I think we would have better results if I took it over.  He seemingly has no idea what he is doing. 

What do you like to make on the grill?  Have you checked out my Chipotle Mango Chicken Kabobs?  I am going to make them when it warms up again. 

Which hopefully will be next week.