Yes. A  salad. It might not be the manliest thing in the world but it’s damn good. We wanted to start the season off with something light as to not pull a muscle because of all the missed training camps and OTAs in the off season. A sprained wrist can not flip burgers.

I’ve grilled plenty of fruit before but never watermelon. After tasting the salad, I’m sure I’ll be grilling more watermelon.

Four year anniversary . . . nothing special . . . maybe to others!

My wife and I began our day of quad-anniversary celebration by eating a fancy breakfast with our 2-year-old son, Elliott, at Cracker Barrel. Promptly, he treated us as well as the CB staff and paying customers to a shattering display of pancake plate tossing. I never wanted to be that guy (or that dad) where everyone is looking at you because of what someone had just done. Thank goodness my wife was there to savor the moment with me. Nevertheless, next stop was to the movies to see Cars 2. Again, and obviously so, given the movie choice, Elliott joined us. Occasional screaming at the screen and questioning aloud of everything should be expected of someone witnessing his first movie ever, right? We were the last people to leave that theater showing. But – finally – later in the evening, once Elliott’s bath was complete and he was tucked safely away in his “big boy” bed, dinner was about to be created.

It was Date Night: The Home Edition . . . with the baby monitor on! The day before “Our Day”, I had found a recipe in the recent issue of Food and Wine: Gingered Salmon with Grilled Corn and Watercress Salad. Initially, I thought that the corn would be grilled and then the final salmon skewers could be thrown on Ethel, too! I was wrong. We could only grill the corn, which meant Pigskin’s Ethel still made a brief appearance:

The dinner turned out great. Actually, it’s an awesome summer dish that we’ll be having again and again in our household. The ginger that was tucked between the prepped slices on the salmon gave it wonderful flavor. However, be wary, initially we thought the salmon wasn’t cooked all the way – “Oh wait, it’s the ginger!” As for the dressing, it was good all by itself and could easily be used for other salads and dishes. We basically followed the recipe. The “tweaks” we made were as follows: about ⅓ more salmon, 2 less ears of corn, same amount of water cress, and barely the required measurements for the dressing. If it said a teaspoon, we added almost a teaspoon. Sorry – we aren’t practicing gastronomy here.

Side note: Doesn’t “gastronomy” sound like something you get after eating something that wasn’t cooked properly? Or, as my wife claims it to sound like – “The Study of Farts.”

Anyway – you get the basic gist of the dish. The dinner was good and we’ll be making it again, but maybe not on Pigskin Gourmet. However, at least you know that we’re working out Ethel during the off season. In addition, we’re keeping our culinary skills in “shape” for cooking and grilling this upcoming season! Oh yeah, to man-ly up this dish (my request), we shared a big bottle of Hellhound beer – a beverage from Dogfish Head. Beer was good, just sadly not with this meal. Of course, the magazine suggested a certain wine, but as you saw in the picture with the corn grilling on Ethel, beer was popped and we stayed the course with that arena of alcohol. For great wine suggestions always visit, 1 Wine Dude.

The successful dinner of Gingered Salmon with Grilled Corn and Watercress Salad helped make our anniversary a great one – with more dinners and anniversaries to come!

Here’s a final look at the meal. Please note that the images taken in this blog were via the camera on my Blackberry and should not be associated with the dazzling pix of Cecil E Rudd Photography.

It’s been awhile since we posted a video, maybe it’s from depression with the Eagles season ending the way they have ended in the past. I’m pretty sure that had a lot to do with it, but whatever the reason is, we have a new video for you from around Christmas. Checkout the background at the end to see Brent’s Christmas village!

In this episode we used Paul Jr the Portable Roadtrip Grill which was given to us from the folks at Coleman. This is the perfect tailgating grill with it’s built in handle, compact size and wheels for easy transportation. Designed by Paul Jr. from American Chopper the grill is outfitted better than most cars with it’s black finish and chrome accents. It also has tool holders and side tables, just like bigger grills and uses small propane (16.4 oz ) cylinders that last up to 1.1 hours on high or 4.5 hour on low.

If you plan on truly  tailgating anytime soon and need a portable way to cook your food, the Paul Jr Designs Coleman Roadtrip Grill should be at the top of your list for portable grilling. Look for us to use it more in upcoming episodes of Pigskin Gourmet.

Special thanks to the people from Coleman for letting us use their grill!

Better late than never! With computer problems we were not able to get this and another episode up in time for Thanksgiving. Even though thanksgiving has passed, we still want you to see what we made and what you missed. The recipe was adapted from this Bobby Flay recipe and you will not only learn how to make this delicious turkey on the grill, you will also learn a ton of facts about turkeys throughout the video.

If you’re looking to make a gourmet burger, look no further than the bible of burger making Bobby Flay’s Burgers, Fries, and Shakes. That’s where we got out recipe for the Bolo Burger. Check out the video to see us make this spanish inspired gourmet burger.

With Fall in full swing, we wanted to take advantage of a good harvest of apples and add a little tailgating twist. If you’ve ever had apple sausage before you will love our version of  Grilled Sausage Stuffed Apples. The sweet and savory taste goes along with a football filled Fall afternoon.

We also made a dessert grilled stuffed apple that features pecans, butter, cinnamon, nutmeg and more.

This week RO*TEL® was kind enough to send us a few cans of their Diced Tomatoes & Green Chilies and Velveeta cheese so we could give their Famous Queso Dip a try. We needed something to dip in the Queso, so we thought, why not have a go at some homemade Philly soft pretzels?

Since we don’t work at the Philly pretzel factory, making a twisted pretzel was out of the question. That’s where pretzel sticks come from. And see, you thought we were just being creative! If you know how to make pretzel twist, by all means, go right ahead and make them! But, for us the sticks work. They may not look like the most photogenic thing before you put them in the oven, but they taste and look good when you take them out.

Make sure you head over to RO*TEL and check out all of their other recipes and products as well as their 52 WEEKS OF GROCERIES and a TRIP TO ONE COLLEGE FOOTBALL GAME OF YOUR CHOICE CONTEST

Recipes
RO-TEL Famous Queso Dip
Homemade Soft Pretzels

There is a thin line between bar and tailgating food and this week we were more on the side of bar food, but we cooked it on the grill so in essence it is tailgating food. You see what I did there? Anyway, if you didn’t notice, around Pigskin Gourmet we love bacon wrapped around pretty much anything. While this might not be a main dish for your tailgate, it is a quick flavorful appetizer that will go with a lot of other dishes.

Also, if you don’t want to fire up the grill but still want your potatoes wrapped in bacon goodness, check out the recipe that inspired us to make these. Appetizer Recipe: Bacon-Wrapped Potato Bites with Spicy Sour Cream Dipping Sauce