Thursday, September 9, 2010

more labor day weekend.

This is the last Labor Day Weekend post inundating you with beach days and good eats. For those of you that have asked for recipes; I linked to them wherever possible in my last post and they are all up on Clean Green Cuisine. Breakfast on day three consisted of Baked French Toast Casserole with bacon and blueberries!
That would be a praline topping consisting of pecans, brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. It is a constant delight to your sense of smell to wander off the beach into G's kitchen. From the crisp salty ocean air through the beachfront slider door you are greeted by all kinds of comforting scents. This mornings cinnamon spices or past nights of pungent seafood smells, laced with warm melted butter, hints of fresh basil....this kitchen always smells incredible and the food always tastes even better.
On the beach today there was kite flying!

Well, there was kite flying everyday.
And Bocce. There was Bocce everyday too.
For lunch, mini lobster rolls and tomato gazpacho.
Cold soup after a morning in the hot sun is fantastic. Leftover lobster was tossed in a little mayo and placed over a bed of lettuce in a hot dog bun for a delicious lunch combo.
We snacked on Pimento cheese dip smothered on Ritz crackers and celery sticks. For dinner it was southern food night! Sweet and smokey spareribs accompanied by peanut lime slaw, white wine braised kale, root beer stove-top beans and more of those yummy biscuits!
Gretchen really outdid herself with this meal. Especially considering the fact that she rarely eats meat and this was her first time cooking spareribes! They were dry rubbed with 
smoked paprika, brown sugar, ground clove, ground ginger and chipotle chili powder, then slow cooked all afternoon. They came out very tender with a syrupy glaze. 
I remembered we had a handle of Southern Comfort Sweet Tea "just add ice and serve" sitting amongst the gin and vodka bottles on the counter. It was the perfect drink to stand up to a hearty southern meal. As you might have gathered, a night here wouldn't be complete without dessert. Tequila watermelon and caipirinha ice pops! And after a rowdy evening, the final day....
Someone had to clean out the fridge before we headed home. Don't worry, I wasn't the only one. It was once again glorious weather so we stuck around for most of the day, doing more of the same. 
And that my friends, is a wrap.

19 comments:

  1. I have the same freeze pop makers and ran into the same problem when I made pina colada pops. I guess we're both heavy handed with the booze :-)

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  2. And she's still jealous :) Holy COW to that french toast casserole!! Out of this world!! And the ice pops are such a fabulous idea, too! So sad summer is ending :(

    Sues

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  3. I want to go to Cape Cod and eat artery clogging breakfasts and cold soup for lunch. My God how I miss the east coast.

    Gorgeous pictures Daisy!

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  4. This weekend was windy! I'm glad your kite didn't bonk you in the head!

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  5. Yum! Delish, loads of fun, since I didn't get to go anywhere for Labor Day, I enjoyed my little virtual vacay here! XX!

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  6. oh that baked fresh toast casserole looks amazing, as does everything else!

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  7. I can't get over what amazing food you had! Silly question -- how did you organize the meals with the group? Did everyone 'own' a day or meal? This summer, a group of my friends went away and we assigned days to couples -- it worked out well but we had so much excess food (and Im not sure we ate as well as you did!!)

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  8. Emily, I'll answer that for you - I relinquish no control in the kitchen and planned and cooked everything! Its my favorite part of the weekend :)

    Daisy, thanks again for the wonderful posts and all the wonderful compliments on my food! You are a fabulous guest, friend and eater!

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  9. Lots of fabulous eats! The french toast casserole sounds especially tempting right now!

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  10. Tequila popsicles!?!! That is making of my kind of weekend haha.

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  11. OK when can we hang out? because not only do you and your friends look like lots of fun but you guys know how to cook!!!! :)

    Happy weekend!

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  12. oh for the love this looks so amazing and fun. pass the popsicles or just come over and we can whip up a batch.

    i'm nowhere near that bass shop thing and don't plan on stepping foot remotely close to it again!! except if i can climb up that polar bear and sit on it's shoulders for a photo op. then maybe i might go back for like 5 minutes.

    xoxo,
    carrie

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  13. Everything looks so good! So much food!

    I especially love those popsicles! Or rather, slushies. LOL. :)

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  14. Whenever I see pictures of Cape Cod, I can't believe such a wealth of beauty is right in our backyard!

    I'm sure you had a magical 4-day weekend vacay! The food looks wonderful. I would love one or two of those ice pops. =)p

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  15. I'm dark green of envy at the moment! such great times. I bet I'm going to dream about that HUGE RIB and ice pops, what an awesome idea :)

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  16. That food looks oh so good!!! How is it that you guys don't weigh 400 lbs?? I sure would after a delicious weekend like that!!

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  17. So many favorites here. I just love the dining room table picture. Everyone gathered around eating is my favorite past time. Love the beach an blue skies too!

    Great blog!
    M

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  18. That High Life pony just made my day!

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