Polenta, Grits, Mush - what's in a name?

Hi everyone,
You know I never liked mush growing up, and grits never really appealed to me either, but as I have gotten a little more "adventurous" in what I will eat I have really started to like polenta.. I know, I know it's made of the same ingredients but somehow it seems to be better, when a braised short rib is resting on it and it is swimming in the juices...  YUM...  OK so I had this big Sirloin I wanted to cook and I didn't want risotto, or potatoes so I thought, let's try some polenta - but grill it..

So I got some coarse corn meal and followed the instructions  water, salt, cornmeal  but of course I wasn't satisfied with that so I added some Pecorino and Parm cheeses as well as some fresh thyme and rosemary and a little freshly cracked black pepper to the mix.   I then put in mini loaf pans and chilled it for 24 hours. 

I took it out and sliced it in about quarter inch thick slices and grilled it next to the Sirloin steak..

I took the Sirloin, and salted it and let it draw out some of the proteins uncovered in the fridge and then seared it very rare on the grill..   Sliced it like London broil and served it with the Grilled Polenta and some steamed broccoli....  Very tasty...   
Take a look :) 

Colorful, huh?

New things

Now that we have cleaned up our mess from the storm I wanted to get back to cooking...  So here are a couple of pics of some of my first tomatoes of the season and my new Himalayan Salt Cooking Stone.  Can't wait to try it so look out for some interesting posts and a review of how it works..   Hear great things about it but also some not so great things - but I will have an open mind.... and a fair review...

Happy 4th of July - Hey don't forget to thank a Veteran for the freedoms we enjoy - Freedom isn't FREE.

Not too big but I bet they taste good

First of July - not too bad, huh?

Himalayan Pink Salt Block - Man is that heavy

Stormy Weather...

Well, for once the weathermen (and ladies) were correct.  They had been telling us to, as one weatherman said, "Go home and batten down the hatches" and they were right...  First storm hit about 6:45, and wouldn't you know it I was right in the middle of making myself a flatbread pizza...   Well, the tornado siren was blaring, Sandy and Ike were headin' to the basement and I was still cutting my flatbread... A man has to have his priorities, right???  

So the first storm came and went - Lots of wind and rain but no damage,  as we did what the weatherman said, and took things down or took them in and wedged them in where no harm could come to them.  So we had a respite between storms and while it was quite a lightning storm, we thought the worst was over.... Boy were we wrong,  About 9:30 I was watching Longmire on A&E (great show by the way - if you haven't seen it you need to check it out - but I digress) and all of a sudden, the NOAA weather alarm started blaring a tornado warning, and rotation was spotted on radar just south of us... So I told Sandy she and Ike should head down to the basement while I checked things out...  The next thing I heard was a big CRACK and thought to myself, "That ain't good".. So I headed down with them for the next 45 minutes until the Tornado Warning expired...  Came back up about 10:15 and the last two of our original Bradford Pear trees were no longer vertical - or at least one of them wasn't the other one had half of it down in the bean field behind us beside the entire the far east one both resting on our fence.  That's gonna leave a mark....

So after going out and checking the rest of the house (no damage so I consider ourselves lucky) I emailed work and said. "Taking a personal day tomorrow!"  So in the day light it wasn't too bad but man, 12 year old trees that are  40' tall and 30+" in circumference have lots of branches!!!  It took us all day but we got it cut up and stacked - saved bigger pieces for firewood, and now I know what I will be doing over the holiday- firing up the wood chipper - anybody want some Mulch???  LOL.  So all in all we are much better off than many, all three of us live to cook another day, and no real permanent damage.. so I consider us pretty lucky as the town we go pheasant hunting in suffered a direct hit by a tornado about 10 days ago...

Check out the pics below...   Note again who was supervising... 

Tree Before

Tree After

Both trees

Different Angle One on the right may need to come down completely

Here is the boss - Supervising is tough work