The grilling season is upon us, like a lion upon a gazelle. So that method, some 80 million folks will be available, fortuitously grilling hot dogs, steak, and hamburgers.
Which is all nicely and true. Who among us does now not enjoy a grilled warm canine, steak, or hamburger? Or, for vegetarians, a grilled basket of veggies? But what if we want something greater? Something one of a kind. And I’m now not speakme approximately chicken or fish, or even shrimp (even though grilled shrimp is incredible, and now not sufficient people make it).
- What if we need grilled pizza?
- What if we need grilled watermelon?
What if we need grilled Caesar salad, like eating places used to make it in the Nineties? What if we need a grilled cheese sandwich? Not one this is cooked on a pan or a griddle, however a real grilled cheese sandwich?
- What if we need to bake bread on a grill?
All you need to do is exchange your manner of wondering. It would help if you began contemplating your grill as nothing more than a supply of heat. You can cook dinner on a pan with it, as you’ll your stove. If it has a cowl, you may use it to roast and bake, as you will your oven. I started with a loaf of bread. I made the dough for the most effective, simplest, and definitely the fastest bread I recognize the way to make, a One-Hour Bread. It doesn’t taste like something special, although neither is it horrific utilizing anyway. This unique bread’s greatest energy is that it most effectively takes one hour to make, from beginning to finish.
I did now not make a more complicated loaf due to the fact. Frankly, I wasn’t one hundred% certain it became going to work, and I didn’t need to waste all of that time and effort on a loaf of bread that grew to become out either undercooked or overcooked — or weirdly cooked — on a grill. I needn’t have concerned. I, without a doubt, ended up with what I assume is the best loaf of One-Hour Bread I actually have ever made; possibly the charcoal added a few complexities that aren’t always typically there. Even so, the bread ended up taking a couple of hours to make. Whether the blanketed grill misplaced heat over the years or if it by no means made up to the 425 degrees at which the bread is typically cooked, I don’t understand.
Just name it an Hour-and-a-Quarter bread and experience. Or higher nevertheless, use your favorite bread recipe and be prepared to extend the baking time if important. I next made a pizza. With a few pizza parlors boasting that they are wooden-fired and others proclaiming the superiority of coal-fired ovens, grilled pizza is natural. It’s best a touch special from the usual way of making it. You brush each aspect of the dough with olive oil (I made my very own. However, you can buy it at some stores) and prepare dinner one aspect over a medium-warm grill for simply a couple of minutes. You turn it over, speedy add your sauce and toppings, and cowl the grill. It will simplest take any other minute or to cook, and also you turn out to be with a conventional pizza experience.
I saved to the unintentional theme of grilled carbohydrates with grilled polenta. This time I used store-bought, cooked polenta, the kind that comes in a tube, even though there is not anything to forestall you from making your own thick polenta, refrigerating it after which slicing it to grill it. On the opposite hand, that’s a whole lot of work. The shop-bought polenta became quality, mainly when fancied up with olive oil, garlic, and rosemary. And after it becomes grilled, it was topped with grated Parmesan and black pepper. It’s simply delightful. A grilled cheese sandwich came next, and that delivered with it a conundrum: How do you butter the bread? After all, is the butter the pleasant part of a grilled cheese sandwich?
This is simplest a trouble while you use reasonably-priced, squishy bread. But reasonably-priced, squishy bread (with American cheese) is what makes the exceptional grilled cheese sandwiches. I first attempted buttering it, but that simplest tore the delicate slices. So I cheated, sort of. Instead, I melted butter in a skillet and dipped the sandwich in that before putting it on the grill.
Grilled cheese on a grill is virtually better than grilled cheese.
I went again in time a bit for my subsequent dish, grilled Caesar salad. It was a aspect twenty years ago or so, and it is nevertheless correct; grilling the lettuce provides an extra dimension to the salad that relatively mitigates the richness of the dressing. All you need to do is brush a bit of olive oil onto complete heads of romaine lettuce and location them at the grill. Serve the heads completely drizzled with Caesar dressing and Parmesan cheese. If you need, you could even turn grilled bread into croutons, too. For a little something extra one of a kind, I ended with the aid of grilling slices of watermelon. Why now not? First, I brushed on a aggregate of lime juice, honey, and olive oil, and then I located the slices on the grill. I’m no longer sure how or why this labored. However, the grill seemed to trade the character of the watermelon. When I took it off the grill, the melon changed into greater savory, less candy. One flavor tester stated it reminded her of butternut squash, and I ought to simplest agree. It’s pleasant, if uncommon, sensation. It’s definitely well worth trying as soon as, to peer if you want it. Just don’t neglect to add salt before eating it to make the flavor pop.
