The Moveable Feast Food Blog

The Moveable Feast is a Personal Chef Service that serves the Hampton Roads area of Southern Virginia. This blog is an extension of my web site www.themoveablefeastpcs.com and will go into more details about food and any food service industries. Any pictures and or recipes that are published here are all the property of The Moveable Feast unless otherwise noted.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Happy 100th post to Myself!
I got up this morning so excited that I actually cooked again last night and have something new to post today. I have been watching the numbers of my posts and thankfully my 100th post was the last post about my cooking slump and the recipe that helped bring me back to cooking reality. I am not sure that hubby is always thrilled about my inspirations and how they affect him. He has been working long hours and then has to come home and fire up the grill to cook my latest inspiration. From now until he has to shiver in the freezing rain, that grill will be going full steam ahead. The moment the sun shines and the leaves on the tree start to bud, I am plotting about what can go on the grill next. I love grilling. Rather I love to watch hubby grill. I know that I prep everything and then he has to do all the work; running back and forth to make sure he didn't burn the dinner. In my wicked heart I think this is pay back for all the fall and winter foods that require me to do all the prep and cooking while he sits in the livingroom watching TV or hovering around me giving me his verbal support. So...

I love going to the grocery store on my days off and checking out the aisles in a slow manner. When I am shopping for my clients, I go armed with a check list and the ulimate goal of going, getting and leaving in a very timely manner. It's an organized fly though the grocery store. When I don't have to fly through the store, I can see things that briefly caught my eye the day before and then give them a closer inspection. The meat counter has been on my radar for quite some time. There has been a trend here to help the consumer speed up dinner but not the way you think. I know that you are thinking that speeding up dinner via the grocery store means, prepackaged unhealthy foods. Not so in every case.

The meat counter has taken to a great tactic to up their sales. My favorite item is the pre-preparation of meats that you can just come home and throw on the grill. There are two preparations that I love because they make my chuckle. One is the beef pinwheel. I know that many of you have seen these in the stores where you live. The one that is most common here is the Spinach Pinwheel made with Flank Steak.

After the flank steak has been sliced and pounded, a layer of some sort of white cheese is laid down in a neat fashion on the meat. Then a rather large layer of spinach or some dark greens are then laid upon the cheese. The end result is rolled up and then sliced to be put on skewers for the grilling pleasure of the consumer. I have to say that I think that is a working man or woman's dream. Nothing complicated, not too many ingredients and you are good to go. Is that a great marketing tool for the meat department or what??

The second item that seems to be gaining popularity are kabobs. Beef is the main one in my area but I have seen a few with chicken. Again, this is a cleaver marketing tool for the meat department. Who could resist buying a package of these kabobs with chunks of red meat or chicken with onions, mushrooms and green or red bell peppers already skewered? It's a no brainer for the busy working consumer. If I didn't cook for a living, I would be plunking down my money to save time in my daily meal planning.

So not to be out done by my local supermarket, I think I have duplicated what they are selling the consumer. It's not hard. There is no recipe and only a few items.

You will need a nice thick flank steak that can be butterflied. Be sure not to be too heavy handed with the knife or you will have two pieces of flank steak to roll up. Cover the meat with either wax paper or plastic wrap. The way I like to do it for easy clean up is to insert the meat in a large gallon zip top bag and then seal it almost shut and pound away. You will tear up the bag but meat won't be splattering all over the cutting board or the counter this way. Salt and pepper the meat. Pick a cheese that you didn't spend a lot of money on. There is a reson for this I promise!


Wash and dry some sort of a green, I think spinach works the best. It doesn't take very long to be steamed by the cooking of the meat. Try to layer the spinach in a neat fashion. It will make rolling up the meat easier. Roll up the meat length wise. You can tie the meat with butcher's twine to help it not fall apart. The piece of meat that I had weighted 1.75 pounds. It was enough to get 6 varying sized of pinwheels for the skewers.

I recommend you use a cheaper cheese in the rolls. It all drips out of the rolls while they are on the grill. The upside to that is, the cheese leaves some flavor in both the meat and the spinach. There was no visible cheese once the skewers came off the grill. I have to say they were very tasty though. I only ate one pinwheel and hubby ate two. There are three wrapped up in the refrigerator. So it fed us really well.


The one last thing that brings me happiness and joy is the sighting of yellow things at 4 for $1, that's the season's first ears of corn. So I bought 4 and figured they were grill worthy. I sprinkled some Mrs. Dash, Garlic and Herb, s&p and some melted butter on them , then wrapped them up in the foil.
They were wonderful and that rounded out the meal! I hope you try this where ever you are and post what your take on this meat dish was. It's so simple that you really don't have to buy it at the supermarket. No recipe, no brainer!

7 Comments:

At 11:31 AM, Blogger s'kat said...

Well what a wonderful way to break in your 100th post, with grilled meat and corn! Congrats!

 
At 4:53 PM, Blogger Michelle said...

WOW! First of all, my heartiest congrats on reaching your 100th post (I've been eyeing my numbers as they go up lately too)! I'm so proud to have known you since your (very almost) beginning! Gosh, I feel like it's your birthday again!

And second WOW! - this dish sounds awesome, looks awesome, and I am so making it as soon as it stops pouring rain and I can coerce LB out the door to the grill to cook it for me! And oh, the thought of corn...most years, my house was surrounded by cornfields growing up and I used to love to play in them (ack! children of the corn!) and eat the corn fresh right off the stalks. It's another of my favorite veggies. About how long did you grill it for? I've never tried doing it myself that way...

 
At 11:24 PM, Blogger Ilva said...

CONGRATULATIONS! You made me hungry and it's still at least THREE hours before I can eat lunch!

 
At 8:35 AM, Blogger Dawn said...

That looks great! And yes, I have seen those for sale at my grocery store. How long did you cook them?

 
At 5:46 PM, Blogger Ed Tep said...

Vickie - Happy 100th! March 30 was special for me, too. It was my one-year anniversary for my blog. Time sure flies when you are blogging about food and dachshunds. heh heh.
Your beef pinweels sound so delicious! What kind of cheese did you use in your recipe?

 
At 6:24 AM, Blogger vlb5757 said...

s'kat-thanks! I love grilled meat and I think I might even get brave enough this year to grow some backyard corn. Hubby is resisting a bit. That means he would have to dig. Not his thing.

Michelle-I answered this post on Saturday but it never did appear. Blogger must have been on the blink...again!

We usually wrap the corn up in the heavy duty foil and then leave it on for as long as it takes the meat so that things are hot to eat together. This time about 20 minutes or so. It's hard to gauge because we had never done those kinds of pinwheels before so we weren't really sure how long to cook them. I like mine pink. If I eat a filet it's RARE for me just like my tuna! The corn can be soaked without shucking, in cold water and then put on the grill. The cold water helps to slow down the burn on the outter layers of husks but yet steams the corn on the inside. You can peel the husks back and then put your seasonings on and then put the husks back and tie them up and then grill them. Of course there is the old stand by of just plunking down the bare cob on the grill and slathering it regularly with butter. The corn is slightly burned but has a really smoky chewy taste. You just can't miss with grill corn as way you do it.

Ilva-I could this kind of stuff breakfast, lunch or dinner. It just tastes good period!

Melissa-I think this would make a great breakfast along side some scrambled eggs.

Ed-I used Monterey Jack and am glad I did since it's a cheaper cheese. It all melted out and was lost but the smoked make some great flavors for the meat anyway.

How's Zoe?

 
At 12:00 PM, Blogger Stephanie said...

Congrats on your 100th post! What a fabulous feast! We used to eat these a lot in Germany but we called it rouladen and there are all sorts of variations but we always made it at home. You are making me very hungry now ...

 

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