Misadventures in Grilling

When Susan and I perused my grilling cookbooks last weekend, we saw one dessert recipe that looked unusual, so we tried it tonight after our meal. It is called "Paradise Grilled" and consists of 1/2-inch thick slices of fresh pineapple sprinkled lightly with cracked green peppercorns and grilled until grill marks are visible on each side. The pineapple is then served drizzled with an orange juice/fresh lime juice/honey/cornstarch sauce and served with vanilla ice cream.

Not all that great. Won't be making that again.

What was great was the rest of the meal. Susan covered a rack of baby back ribs with a rub and started them in the oven. I finished them on the grill and slathered them in barbecue sauce in the final minutes. Susan cleaned fresh asparagus and covered them in olive oil and seasoning, and I tossed them into my grill pan and made them on the grill. Susan made lumberjack potatoes in the oven, and that rounded out the meal. Delicious.

But one more misadventure (besides the misguided choice of dessert): I burned my finger on the handle of the grill pan while I was unloading the grilled asparagus from it. The pot holder I was using just wasn't big enough, and some of the exposed metal exposed my right index finger to searing heat, and now I've got a few tiny blisters to show for it.

P.S. Hillary has had a few blisters in the palms of her hands from playing on the monkeybars at school. One of them popped yesterday, so this morning she held up her open palm for me to see the dried blood marking the blister site. She said, "Do you know what this is?" I said, "Stigmata." (This and this are available to those of you who need them.)