Thunder Hits the Stage in Atlanta

This past weekend we headed down to Hotlanta to help celebrate our Brother-in-Law Dave's 50th birthday. It was a great time seeing their family again and meeting a lot of their friends too.

We travel down there a lot because it's just fun to hang out with them! Ok, that and it's about the 1/2 way point to our place in Florida! ;-) A typical weekend with them is to arrive, go to the grocery store and buy veggies and stuff, then Dave and I concoct some sort of exotic dish while the girls sit and visit. Of course we usually sample different varieties of either beer or wine while cooking which also keeps us entertained.

This time though we attended a big party that was arranged to celebrate Dave's turning a 1/2 a century. It was set up so that he could have to opportunity to play guitar all night while all the other band members swapped in and out on various songs. It was a fun night and the music was spectacular! I was honored to be able to get up on stage with such talented musicians!


Here's the star of the show jammin out



A shot of myself with a better view of the band












I'm looking forward to the next trip down!

Musikkapelle Ruderatschofen

Saturday evening I had the pleasure of meeting the Musikapelle Ruderatchofen, the main band playing at the downtown Cincinnati Oktoberfest! My good friend Ollie invited me to tag along with him to enjoy some good home cooked German food and some good German beer, while listening to some good German music!

We got to meet some of the band members and mingle with some of the members of various German American groups from around the city, we're members of the Donauschwaben Verein. These groups are trying to preserve some of the heritage and culture through song, dance, food, language, and of course beer!

Here is my friend Ollie to the left and our host for the evening, Mike, to the right

The Musikkapelle Ruderatschofen performing for us











The hosts had some of these awesome flowers planted around the place and I couldn't resist taking a couple of photos hoping to be able to identify them. Anyone know what these are?

Let Us Never Forget!

Thank you to the brave who have stepped up to answer the call of duty protecting freedom, and curse those that would try to steal that freedom through the taking of innocent lives!

Labor Day Weekend Grillapalooza!

More Americans fire up the grill on Labor Day weekend than on any other, with the possible excepting being the 4th of July. So in honor of that tradition we decided to hold the first ever Grillapalooza, or as Lightnin refers to it Meat Mania! We lit the fires on the Brinkman smoker to cook ribs, the big Weber for rib eye steaks and lamb chops, and the medium Weber for ham steaks and chicken breasts!

I've been grilling for a long time, a little over 30 years now, and continually work on honing those skills and I think I'm getting close to perfection with this rib recipe, but not so fast let's talk about the other meats first and we'll get back to the ribs.


The Rib eyes we dusted with a commercial grilling spice that included coriander, garlic, powder, salt, pepper, and a few other goodies, and then gave them a spritzing with some good Tennessee bourbon. After letting them sit with this mixture for several hours they went on the grill.
The Lamb chops we treated with some Xin Jian spice that somehow made it's way into my luggage when I left Beijing, again letting them sit for a couple hours and then onto the grill.



The Chicken breasts we merely salted and peppered and then on the grill because they will be used to make some other yet undetermined meals this next week.
The Ham we dusted with dry ground mustard seed and then dusted with the rib dry rub (we'll get to it in a minute) and then a spritzing of the bourbon, then onto the grill!




So then let's see what's left, oh oh that's right, the ribs! ;-)
The ribs we dusted with our home made curry powder, let them sit over night in the fridge, and then dry rubbed them with this mixture: 2cups brown sugar, 3 TBS cracked black pepper, 2 TBS cayenne pepper, 1 TBS smokey paprika. Then into the smoker they went!

The choice of wood for the event was a mixture of Maple, apple, and oak chips which give a little more mild smoke flavor than either hickory or mesquite.







So what would you prepare to go with all this meat? We decided to do some prosciutto wrapped asparagus, and cheesy potatoes and broccoli.













Well, there you have it Grillapalooza! I think we'll make this an annual event, and who knows maybe next year we'll expand the menu and put something on the little Weber too!

Happy Labor Day everyone!

What a view!

Last evening Lightnin and I decided to hop on the bike for a little while and buzz around our neck of the woods. We forgot to grab the camera, of course, but Lightnin did get these shots of the sun set as we were heading home:





















By the way didn't anyone pay attention to the background in the photos of the wine festival? ;-)

Swiss Wine Festival and the Germania Oktoberfest

This past weekend was action packed with Lightnin and I taking a trip to Vevay, Indiana with our friends Steve and Donna to attend the Swiss Wine Festival on Saturday, and then by ourselves to the Germania Oktoberfest on Sunday!

The wine festival was in Switzerland County, hence the name of the event.

However I think this photo sums it up more accurately!

There were some really good and interesting wines to be sampled, and here we see our friend Steve doing just that!

Here's Steve sampling another of the available wines!

Lucky for us they had two different varieties of dry red wines so Steve could sample the second one!

And what Swiss Wine Festival would be complete without a mechanical bull ride?

And what sort of food would you expect at such an event? Why fried green tomatoes and frog legs sounds reasonable to me!









On to Germania!

So what comes to mind when you think Oktoberfest? Beer, Brats, Limburger cheese? Why no silly, of course it would be the Corn Head!

And just check out this view from a place that used to be called "Top of The Hill". We stopped off there on our way back home and couldn't resist taking the photo.









It was a great weekend with temperatures in the 70's and lots of sunshine!
This coming Labor Day weekend is supposed to be just as beautiful and we plan to spend it grilling out a variety of meats, so check back and see what's cookin'!