July 4th Specials. Recipes For a Cookout

   As I sit here planning my July 4th menu, trying to figure out what will make my life a little bit easier, and the holiday a lot more enjoyable, I started flipping through my recipes looking for the ones have been crowd pleasers and also either make-ahead, or fairly easy to do. A few really stood out and so I'm sharing those for your weekend holiday celebrating .

   First up, 15 Minute Sweet Pickles. These are simple bread and butter pickles that can be made in 15 minutes in the microwave, for real. They're always on my table for July 4th and will make anyone look like the pickle Queen or King. Astound your family and friends.

   Of course what would the 4th be without Strawberry Shortcake

I usually make these shortcakes ahead and take them to our friend Mr. X's house for fireworks viewing. I assemble them there in just a few minutes. These travel well.

   If you're serving vanilla ice cream or perhaps want a different sort of topping for shortcakes, check out  Pickled Strawberries a twist on the usual strawberries in balsamic vinegar. Serve them on ice cream, or over whipped ricotta.

Speaking of strawberries, there's always good old fashioned Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

Serve it in a bowl, or make a chocolate ice cream sandwich.

And while on the subject of strawberries and cheesecake, one could go all the way and just make a Strawberry Cheesecake

This one is light and made with eggs and ricotta cheese, and 1/3 of a cup of flour, or if you're gluten free just use gluten free flour.

On the savory side, instead of baked beans my favorite side dish, or even main dish for vegetarian friends are these Indian Black Eyed Peas.

I'll be making these ahead today (they cook up very quickly if using frozen black eyed peas) and letting the flavors mellow overnight.

In the side dish salad department I'm always looking for coleslaw alternatives, so here are a few.
Tomato,Cucumber, and Coconut Salad all raw and easy to do.

Since I'm going raw here, a couple more salads for the Paleo crew.
An absolutely uncooked Carrot, Beet, and Pistachio Salad

Here's a Beet Salad that can be made a ahead and served cold or at room temperature. Tasty.

Make a pot of rice tonight and whip this  Cold Rice Salad up tomorrow.

Or you might try this "No Cook" Carrot Slaw

For the traditionalist who wants a change, here's an Indian Style Potato Salad

Another fast and easy different side dish is this Radish and Peanut Salad

I'm already planning to serve this  Indian Spiced Corn to my guests tomorrow.

If you like your corn in a cool salad here's a make ahead one of Corn and Coconut

Swinging back to the sweet side here are some ice creams.
For the vegans Fast Vegan Chocolate

And 5 Minute Chcolate Cherry Ice Cream that can be made vegan by swapping out the dairy yogurt for soy or some other non dairy.

For regular traditional ice cream there's Vanilla Chelan Cherry Ice Cream with Valrhona Chocolate Pearls

Blueberry Buttermillk Ice Cream

If you don't have an Ice Cream Machine try Indian Kulfi

There's also Orange Blossom and Pistachio

For those who might be looking for a Non-Alcoholic Celebration a Virgin Cocktail that won't get anyone in trouble. The Virgin G & T

And finally, what would the 4th be without Watermelon? You try it in a Watermelon Mousse

   So there they are some thing you might like to try for your weekend celebrations or anytime during the Summer Cookout season. Have a safe and sane (but of course not too sane) 4th, catch you on the flipside.  Follow along on Twitter @kathygori

The Mango The Avocado and The Pom Part 3. The Anti (oxidant) Cocktail

   One thing I've learned living in Wine Country is that not everyone drinks. Or at least not everyone drinks all the time, everywhere. There are events, occasions, and reasons to want something cool,  refreshing, and non-alcoholic. I always welcome a party that offers me something more than the conventional soft drink as an alternative. I drink a lot of water, and as I've mentioned before, I wasn't brought up with the soda habit so any soft drink I'm going to be interested in had better bring the tart and tamp down the sweet. Which brings me to my final quick fix for those hot weather holiday parties. A Pom Anti-Cocktail.

   I might call it the  Anti Cocktail because it's a virgin (blush blush) that is, no alcohol. Or I might call it an Antioxidant Cocktail because pure pomegranate juice is packed with antioxidants. Either way this one hits the spot, and when there are all those random traffic checkpoints on The Fourth of July  weekend, you'll be glad you chose this.

Non Alcoholic Pomegranate Cocktail

Here's What You Need:

A bottle of PomWonderful pure pomegranate juice
1 or 2 Tbs of Kaffir Lime Simple Syrup use one to start with and check for sweetness
Ice cubes
Plain mineral water
Lime wedge (optional)

Here's What To Do:

Pour about 1 inch of pomegranate juice into a tall glass.
Add in the Karffir Lime syrup.
Drop in some ice cubes.
Gently pour in the mineral water.

Top with a lime wedge.
It's kind of cool to serve it this way as I like that blend of colors from dark to clear, but definitely stir it up before you drink it.

   Tall, cool, not too sweet, and it'll definitely keep you out of trouble this holiday weekend.
 Wishing my fellow USA'ers a Happy National Birthday and I hope everybody who's celebrating this week has a great time. I know we will.

   Coming up next , a very fast, gluten free, Indian alternative to the usual pasta or potato salad served at Summer Cookouts. Follow along on Twitter @kathygori

Gin and Tonic. A Virgin's Tale

   Last week was a pretty difficult one dealing with my Mom's cancer diagnosis and her obsession with parking in San Francisco. Thankfully, everything now seems to be under control. She's had all her tests, and is cleared for surgery. She's got her date with the doctor booked for July 6th and is planning some sort of awesome revenge appearance at some sort of dinner dance party set for 2 weeks after the surgery. Seems she's having a feud with some friend of hers about who's sitting at what table, with whom. Something about tickets bought in advance, and my mom feels dissed.

   "Fuck 'em " she said to me on the phone (her words not mine). "We're going to that party, if I have to crawl there. Rose can sit with her fancy friends... I don't give a shit. I'll show her"

   Okay. If that's what it takes to get her through this, you go girl! I always thought laughter was the best medicine but evidently revenge really kicks ass. My mother is Italian after all, and if she wants to go swanning into some church benefit party two weeks after surgery like Michael Corleone, who am I to stop her? After all what can you say about somebody who thinks Mae Rose Prizzi is a role model?



   I got a voice mail this morning. I picked it up and it was my mom reading me the Webster's definition of feisty, (her doctor called her feisty) and she wanted to know if I thought being called feisty was an insult.

   "No", I explained. "Feisty is Shirley Mc Laine. Feisty is Betty White." She seemed happy with that definition. Plotting revenge, parsing the definition of feisty, wondering if her doctor is dating anyone. It's going to be a busy next two weeks.

   So far during the last week, there have been moments when I have just wanted to check out mentally and go for the buzz. That however, is not an option. When dealing with Fran, one must have one's wits about one, and it's important to live in the reality-based community 24/7. So when the real thing won't or can't do, I always say go for the illusion.

   Which brings me to my quest for a tall, cool Summer cocktail that refreshes without altering any reality. A drink that allows you to put your feet up while still keeping a head on your shoulders for emergency revenge parties. I decided to experiment with some of the simple syrups I've been brewing and see if I could cook up a pleasing alternative to one of Alan's favorite Summer cocktails. I figured Alan would be the perfect subject to test my skills on (after all he grew up in Westport Connecticut, total Madmen G&T territory where they're born with swizzle sticks in hand). I wanted to see if I could make a fake cocktail just as tasty as a real one.

   That brings me to my virgin G & T.

Virgin Gin and Tonic

What you need:

2 cups of water
1 cup of sugar
30 juniper berries
4 or 5 peppercorns
2 limes
tonic water
fizzy mineral water
fresh mint leaves


Here's What to Do: 

Mix together 2 cups of water and 1 cup of sugar.
Bring the mix to a boil and take it off the fire. Add in the juniper berries and peppercorns.
Put a lid on the sugar water mixture and let everything steep for about 1 hour.
Pour the mixture through a strainer, leave out the juniper berries and peppercorns and pour the flavored simple syrup into a clean bottle and refrigerate until you're ready to use it.

Tear a few mint leaves up, and muddle them in the bottom of a tall slender glass.
Add in 3 Tbs of the juniper simple syrup.
Add 1 Tbs of fresh lime juice
Swizzle everything together.
Add ice.
Fill the rest of the glass with a mix of 1/2 tonic water, and 1/2 mineral water.
Mix well
Squeeze a wedge of fresh lime into the mix and pop the wedge on the edge of  the glass.

   So how did it work? Pretty damn good. We had a three day heatwave in Sonoma this weekend and we were in the middle of writing this pilot we're working on. He wanted something tall and cool and refreshing. If it wasn't a work day a G&T would have been perfect. So, I made him one of these.

   "Whaddya think?"I asked him. "Is it okay?"

    "Tastes great" he said. There was a pause. "I keep expecting the buzz"

   Bingo!

   So if you're looking for a non-alcoholic drink this Fourth of July weekend for whatever reason, you might try one of these. You won't be sorry.

   I had some doubts the other day when I posted about what we were going through on the family front here, but I was so wrong about being worried. It really helps to share these things even though it goes against all my Italian and Hollywood omerta. I want to thank all of you who've reached out to me. I really, really, really appreciate all your good thoughts and wishes for my mom's recovery. I think the fact that she's "feisty" is going to go a long way. Now if I can just keep her from hiring a hitman to take out Rose, we'll be in good shape.

   Coming up next, quick pickles for all your summer barbecues. Follow along on Twitter @kathygori

A Tall Cool One. Kaffir Lime Soda, A Dynamite Drink Minus The TNT

   I didn't get any of them as a kid. Not a lot of candy or sweets either. No snowballs or chocolate frosted cupcakes with those white squiggles across the top. No Twinkies, Ho Hos, or Ding Dongs. No Yoo Hoos, or Whoopeie Pies. I didn't know from Little Debbie. They weren't total strangers. I knew about them and I did try to swap my moms hockey puck-like butter cookies for a friend's sugary treat once in a while, or every day at lunch. No dice.  It wasn't that I was raised on some hippy commune being fed tofu or sprouts. There was no theory of child rearing behind the lack of sweets. Its just that when I was growing up, those things were considered expensive around our house. Homemade may not have been tastier but it was cheaper. Soda was out too.

   I didn't grow up with Coke, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper, Seven-Up, or Mountain Dew. No sweet and fizzies at my house. The issue there was once again sugar, and also The Bubbles. My mother had some sort of issue with carbonation and the likelyhood of carbonated drinks leading to a potential internal explosion. The only other person I'd ever heard a similar story from was my friend Irving Ong who's mom had a similar theory.
 
   Of course soda wasn't totally absent from my life. There were friend's birthday parties where all sorts of forbidden things were served, but mothers were given orders, I was to have no soda.  The only soft drink I was allowed to drink was something called Bireley's Orange Soda which was non carbonated. So, I would be sent off with a birthday present in one hand and a bottle of Bireleys in the other.  Sadly, Birely's is no longer available around here. There is only one place it can be found. Here. Mothra was a huge Bireleys fan.

...and here.



   So, that's why I never developed the habit for sugary soda. But even the best habits are made to be broken, and I've never really been able to give up the search for a cool refreshing non alcholoic drink on a hot hot Summer afternoon. Which led me to experiment with simple syrups.
Simple syrups can be made up of anything and everything, but they always start with 1 cup of sugar and two cups of water.

After that your own and the only limit is your imagination.

Kaffir Lime Simple Syrup

Here's What You Need:

2 Tbs of Kaffir lime simple syrup 
1 Tbs of fresh squeezed lime juice.
Plain mineral water

Here's What To Do:

In a tall glass, mix together 2 Tbs of Kaffir lime simple syrup, 1 Tbs of fresh squeezed lime juice and ice cubes.
Stir everything together well.
Fill the glass with mineral water, stir it together well again. Enjoy.
 
   There it is, clean, simple, and refreshing, a great drink for a workday, or for those guests who don't drink alcohol. These last two hot Sonoma days we've been enjoying this drink in the afternoons while we work, and even though it's bubbly, no one has exploded yet!

Coming up next, juniper berries and the search for a Virgin G&T for the Fourth of July.
Follow along on Twitter @kathygori