Monday Night Dinner #10

When my dad said that he wanted a "big salad" for dinner the next Monday I was in full-on grill mode---so I immediately knew what I was going to do. A grilled salad.

I'd never done it before, but I will absolutely do it again.

Here is a blurry grill picture. It's the only one I have of the grilled romaine---and that was one of the best parts. I researched a little online, and this is what I ended up doing: Slice the lettuce in half so the two parts are still being held together by the bottom stalk part. Rub both sides in olive oil and freshly ground black pepper. Grill on medium-high for 30 seconds-1 minute on each side.


I'm really not very good at taking pictures with a camera phone. Sorry about that. This is the salad, sans-asparagus. This was just a better picture (if you can imagine a worse one...) I started with a bed of fresh non-grilled baby spinach (all ingredients minus spinach, walnuts, and avocado were grilled) then added the separated leaves of grilled romaine, the squash and zucchini, eggplant, poblano peppers, mushrooms, baby roma tomatoes, tofu, avocado, and walnuts; all sprinkled with a garlicky balsamic vinaigrette. The bowl weighed about 5 pounds. It was glorius.


Here is Thom's plate. He's good at the picture taking. I really wish I were eating this right now! And I ate the leftovers already for lunch!


For an appetizer we had more grilled artichokes:


And for dessert we had grilled pineapple and coconut ice cream---mom's wonderful idea! So good. I sprinkled the pineapple with cinnamon, as recommended by the Wegmans magazine from which my mom got the idea. It said to use honey, but it was good without. Who needs pineapple to be sweeter? We served it with coconut flavored Purely Decadent Coconut Milk ice cream...best decision ever. If you haven't tried
the coconut milk ice cream: DO IT! You'll be glad you did.


And now for some good and bad news. Bad news: Monday Night Dinners are canceled for the next two weeks. Good news: This Sunday Thom and I are taking off on a 16-day motorcycle camping roadtrip to the Florida Keys! I am so, so excited. If anyone has any suggestions of where to eat or what to do along the way, give us a shout!