Jump to content
  • Welcome to the eG Forums, a service of the eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters. The Society is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization dedicated to the advancement of the culinary arts. These advertising-free forums are provided free of charge through donations from Society members. Anyone may read the forums, but to post you must create a free account.

Eat to beat the heat?


Recommended Posts

it was hotter than FORK in the wine country today (and this weekend)... so, i resorted to firing up the grill at 9pm last night and grilled off a flank steak marinated in olive oil, s&p, garlic & parsley and a bunch of chicken breasts marinated in tj's mole sauce.

i didn't even think of eating them last night... but they sure tasted great in salads today  :biggrin:

Yep, that's our strategy, grill tons of chicken breasts and veggies and keep in fridge with salad fixin's. Also have hoummous and taboule on hand for vegetarian dinner.

"Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast" - Oscar Wilde

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I never remembing seeing a regional weather map like I saw on sunday morning, the entire U.S. is ninety or better! Whoa , global warming.

I'm living on cottage cheese, tuna, slices of vegetables from mly garden, home pickled beets and hard boiled eggs.

Keeping whole wheat pita bread in the house for easy sandwiches.

and, of course, sweet ice tea, because this ohio girl is more than a little bit country.

Have not found the courage to stand over my Webber grill in this heat.

---------------------------------------

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I hear rumors it might hit 100 in Boston, MA.

I'm in the non-appliance-usage category. Instead, I like to assemble: Caprese salad, beans in vinaigrette, watermelon and feta salad, pate and cheese from Formaggio Kitchen and bread from Clear Flour.

Eating pizza with a fork and knife is like making love through an interpreter.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Forgot to add that when at work no matter what one is eating EAT IT IN THE WALK IN!!

I always attempt to have the ratio of my intelligence to weight ratio be greater than one. But, I am from the midwest. I am sure you can now understand my life's conundrum.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm originally from California, so any humidity really really bothers me. Yesterday it was over 105f( with the humidex).

To make matters worse, last night was our Community Kitchen planning meeting. I'm the coordinator so I plan what we will cook on Thursday night. Who could even think of cooking stews, lasagnas, etc in this heat.

But, you can't freeze salads so we had to come up with something, but I said if less than 5ppl show, I'm cancelling this months kitchen.

No go as 5 ppl showed up.

so, we're cooking on Thursday, thankfully only 2 things need to be oven baked.

Oh and for dinner I had subway( gross I know, but it was either than or Mcdonald's or KFC). I wasnt cooking and the pickings are slim here in small town Ontario.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I eat a lot of salads when it's this hot. And ya'll, I don't know about California, but here it is HOT.

I don't understand why rappers have to hunch over while they stomp around the stage hollering.  It hurts my back to watch them. On the other hand, I've been thinking that perhaps I should start a rap group here at the Old Folks' Home.  Most of us already walk like that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I forgot to mention one easy thing to do when the weather is hot is to buy one of those pre-cooked rotisserie chickens they sell in the grocery stores.

By the time I get my groceries home, the still-warm chicken can be easily deboned by hand (I find it more difficult to remove all the meat if the chicken is cold or has been refrigerated). I get just about every shred of meat off that sucker and the carcass can be frozen for making stock when the weather is cooler.

Then you can use the chicken meat for multiple meals for everything from tacos, burritos, wraps, salads, sandwiches, and so on.

It's a real time-saver.

 

“Peter: Oh my god, Brian, there's a message in my Alphabits. It says, 'Oooooo.'

Brian: Peter, those are Cheerios.”

– From Fox TV’s “Family Guy”

 

Tim Oliver

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, it isn't normal here (San Jose), but when I got home yesterday, my patio registered 102 in the shade. Though I'm originally from New Orleans, I'm just not used to it anymore. Sooooo...lots of ice cold watermelon, a salad Nicoise and sherbet last night. Tonight, salad with cold grilled chicken atop, more watermelon and I may make ice cream or a peach sorbet! But, NO real cooking! :raz:

Just a simple southern lady lost out west...

"Leave Mother in the fridge in a covered jar between bakes. No need to feed her." Jackal10

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh yeah, I forgot...I have no air conditioning. We don't need it here in the bay area.... (at least not normally) :cool:

Edited by cajungirl (log)

Just a simple southern lady lost out west...

"Leave Mother in the fridge in a covered jar between bakes. No need to feed her." Jackal10

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh yeah, I forgot...I have no air conditioning.  We don't need it here in the bay area.... (at least not normally) :cool:

I forgot to mention that as well...

"Under the dusty almond trees, ... stalls were set up which sold banana liquor, rolls, blood puddings, chopped fried meat, meat pies, sausage, yucca breads, crullers, buns, corn breads, puff pastes, longanizas, tripes, coconut nougats, rum toddies, along with all sorts of trifles, gewgaws, trinkets, and knickknacks, and cockfights and lottery tickets."

-- Gabriel Garcia Marquez, 1962 "Big Mama's Funeral"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I went a long time not thinking about "summer cooking" as a special thing.

When I lived in Austin, I had air conditioning, and big power bills.

When I lived in Denver, the temperature dropped like a stone after the sun went down.

When I lived in Virginia, I had air conditioning, and big power bills.

When I lived in North Carolina, I had air conditioning and massive power bills.

Now that I live in Washington, I have no air conditioning, and very reasonable power bills. But when it gets hot (which it is slated to do again this weekend), it's time for alternatives.

We had a house session during the last unpleasant weekend in late June, and in the afternoon, in direct sun, I'm busy frying homemade sausage in a cast iron skillet...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

High (for the locale) humidity and heat, no a/c. We're on a roll with

Caprese, cold meats, pate, cheese, pickles, olives, ice water, bread, crackers. Corn on the cob. Assorted veggies, nuked, served cold. Lettuce salads topped with whatever and dressed on a whim (asian-influenced dressings "feel" cooler). Home-made icecream*. Anyone who turns on the oven will be shot on sight. The toaster oven may be used in limited quantities, preferably while placed outdoors. There is unlimited microwave use.

*I've heard that technically icecream is lousy warm weather food as it generates more heat in digestion (calorie content) than it cools, but the illusion holds for us.

"You dont know everything in the world! You just know how to read!" -an ah-hah! moment for 6-yr old Miss O.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've been instructed by the non-cook in the family to desist from using the oven or even boiling water for pasta or blanching veggies, for the duration of the heat wave. So last night we ate leftover grilled chicken from my sister's Bastille Day party, leftover Italian potato and green bean salad from Sunday night, then two salads I made just for last night's dinner: one with pink beans, diced jicama, scallions, cilantro, lots of garlic and Penzey's chili powder, the other of julienned raw baby zucchini with a dressing of garlic, full-fat yogurt and lemon juice with fresh mint, basil and parsley. For dessert ripe canteloupe with blueberries.

Tonight I'm going to brave standing over the Weber and grill the pork chops I thawed out (the Sweet and Garlicky ones from Raichlen's BBQ Bible), and I'll also sweat over the stove steaming jasmine rice and sauteeing assorted summer squashes. By then I may be dreaming of takeout, but I do actually enjoy the heat when I can get to take breaks from it.

Do you think garlic has a cooling effect?

Jennifer Brizzi

Author of "Ravenous," a food column for Ulster Publishing (Woodstock Times, Kingston Times, Dutchess Beat etc.) and the food blog "Tripe Soup"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, yes, welcome to the special hell that I live in 5 months of the year.  We crank the air-conditioning, ignore the weather, and cook whatever the hell we want.

Well, I can't ignore the weather; I work construction. We like to say that we "build our own shade" but it wasn't much succor until I rigged up an evaporative-cooling system with a garden hose, some misting nozzles,and a 48" barn fan. It helps.

I don't eat much during the day but after work, a full-cold shower (growndwater here seems to run about 68* F) followed by a bowl of gazpacho washed down with a supercooled lawnmower beer really helps. I also switch from my Sealy to a MegaLoMart brand air mattress, and that can be pretty nice. I like it best when I wake up chilly in the middle of the night. Sometimes when I come in after a day of driving screws and bangin' nails, I swear I can hear the A/C bog down as it takes on the strain....

I've noticed the same thing about garlic. Too, I reckon if I eat lots of garlic, and make sure the other guys are eating bananas, then the mosquitos will bother them and not me.

This whole love/hate thing would be a lot easier if it was just hate.

Bring me your finest food, stuffed with your second finest!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

no ac - just fans upstairs and dehumidifiers downstairs. luckily the farmer's market this weekend had some good stuff so all kinds of salad makings, some raw milk cheddar cheese, fresh peaches and raspberries, local corn(in the microwave). i don't sleep well in the heat so i'm up early and cook whatever i need to - elbows or farfalle for pasta salad, chicken breasts, hanger steak and one morning i was sitting outside and hot smoking salmon at 630 am in my pjs.

soy yoghurt, fruit, now that the tomatoes are in bbt's (basil, bacon and tomato), for johnnybird a peach kuken with vanilla toffuti... and carafes of coffee and tea in the fridge.

Nothing is better than frying in lard.

Nothing.  Do not quote me on this.

 

Linda Ellerbee

Take Big Bites

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm also in the Bay Area, but in the part of the Bay Area where a/c is essential during the summer.

Last night we had a pasta salad with chicken with nice cold watermelon for dessert.

For tonight, I'll probably do sirloin steaks on the Foreman grill, with another cold pasta salad and some kind of fresh veggie.

Cheryl

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Tonight I'm frying chicken.

Outside, though. If I do it inside, the dogs go nuts.

I always attempt to have the ratio of my intelligence to weight ratio be greater than one. But, I am from the midwest. I am sure you can now understand my life's conundrum.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I live in a two-story apartment, with an upstairs kitchen. So I come home each day to a sweltering kitchen a good ten degrees warmer than the thermostat, HELPFULLY located on the first floor, would indicate. But I'll be damned if I'm going to pay for cooling the entire vacant apartment, all day, just to have a livable temp upstairs, when I come home. Sucks, regardless. Particularly when my fair city of Charlottesville, VA is clocking in at 97 degrees at 5 in the afternoon (105, heat index).

Much obliged to all the no-cook options. I find that I crave cold, leftovers I'd normally heat. And not the usual options, such as pizza. Odd stuff. Like leftover Thai food. Weird, but there you go.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I left the HOTTTTT South to move here for the weather, and it's been 90's for a week here!!! (So we went to Sunny Tennessee for the weekend---another story).

Last night we had lemon/pepper red snapper on the grill, with leftover fried rice DD made whilst we were gone---several tomatoes from the garden for salad.

Right now, there's a morning-simmered wild rice salad in the fridge, with chives, pimientos, slivered water chestnuts, baby peas, thyme, soy and a drop of sesame oil. The tiniest of the green beans, blanched whole in salted water, shocked, and tossed in a rice vinegar/sugar/black mustard seed vinaigrette, with soft Northern beans, sliced Vidalias, a chopped tomato and green peppers from the garden.

Chicken paillards are soaking in a yoghurt/salt mixture, and will go on the grill PSSSST PSSST for just a minute. Fresh crusty baguettes from DD's bakery.

Lots of lemony iced tea. All INDOORS.

ETA: Welcome, ThatGrrl---your avatar shows that you haven't changed a BIT!!

Do you still wear those little twinkly Piccolinos?

And I used to have a kitchen Just. Like. That. I so badly wanted to cut a hole in the back wall and put in an exhaust fan. A really big one.

Edited by racheld (log)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks, racheld! I try to keep up my image. Actually, I went for a number of years with Marlo's trademark "flip" haircut, hence the nickname. The cut is gone, but the name remains. And the go go boots only come out of retirement at Halloween. Heh.

What I would GIVE for an exhaust fan for my kitchen, in addition to the standard, obviously inadequate for the purposes, over-the-stove one. Anyone who designs a southern apartment with a second floor kitchen should be forced to cook in it, during the summer.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I eat tons of popcicle type treats. I love Whole Fruit Bars, Bomb Pops (also knows as Firecracker bars...you know the Red, White and Blue Bars which are flavored Cherry, Lemon Ice and Blue Rasberry and so refreshing!), Minute Maid Fruit Bars (which have tons of Vitamin C, and Come with grape, oranage and cherry and are fruity delicious!).

I also Love Ice Cream of course, and just picked up a gallon of mint chocolate chip, you know the white icecream that is mint flavored with the black dark chocolate shavings in it

I freeze fruit too, usaully bananas and grapes...both are wonderful to munch on frozen and even better when they just start to thaw a bit.

I also love making smoothies. I blend whatever is around, frozen fruit with fresh fruit, juice and once in a while yogurt..and if I am only using fresh fruit I add ice. My favorite combo is Watermelon/Orange or Cantelope/watermelon. The melon textures make for wonderful smoothies...its the crispness and large water content of these fruits that work so nicely. Also, banana also works with strawberries or bluwberries or oranges too! MMMM GOOD

"One Hundred Years From Now It Will Not Matter What My Bank Account Was, What Kind of House I lived in, or What Kind of Car I Drove, But the World May Be A Better Place Because I Was Important in the Life of A Child."

LIFES PHILOSOPHY: Love, Live, Laugh

hmmm - as it appears if you are eating good food with the ones you love you will be living life to its fullest, surely laughing and smiling throughout!!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...