Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Simple Summer Side

There are a lot of things that my Dad does well: he's the best Dad ever (and proving to be a great Grandpa as well), he's one helluva storyteller, a great athlete and the man can grill. My Mom takes the cake in the kitchen (her dishes and memories of cooking at home are what inspire me to cook -- and write this blog), but Dad's got the magic touch with the grill. I'm guessing there's some man gene that makes the open flame appealing to the male gender (my testosterone-laiden fiance loves to man the grill as well), but not all do it with the impeccable timing of my Dad. The side dishes will be ready in fifteen minutes? He'll wait three more to put the steak on. Along with meats, he grills a mean vegetable, but my favorite thing that he grills? A little tuber named: the sweet potato.

There's nothing fancy about this dish -- slice your sweet potato, lightly cover it in olive oil and coat with seasoning. Since I was recently told that I have borderline high blood-pressure -- I'm 25, workout six times a week and never salt my food -- I use a salt-free all-purpose herb blend as my seasoning. I have a sneaking suspicion that my blood pressure number has a lot to do with the amount of coffee that I drink -- but I'm waiting for someone to tell me that to snap me out of denial.

Grilled Sweet Potato (or yam!) gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan

Will feed two for a side dish.

One large sweet potato, washed and thinly sliced (I usually don't peel mine -- gotta love that fiber!)
1/4 to 1/3 cup olive oil
1 to 2 tablespoons salt-free seasoning

The easiest way to do this is to create a little assembly line: place your olive oil in a shallow dish, your seasoning on a plate and dip and dip. Place on a pre-heated grill at medium heat and cook for about 5 minutes on both sides. They're delicious plain, or dipped in ketchup or BBQ sauce. Now that's a lot of dipping.


5 comments:

Melanie said...

Oh I love the new picture of Henry on the Title! So cute!

Liz said...

Thanks GG! I figured he needed to be in the header since he is the star of the blog ;)

Emilia said...

I eat a lot of sweet potatoes, since I can't eat regular potatoes without getting sick.

I didn't know that they don't need peeling, I never peel regular potatoes so why not leave the skin on these as well. It probably tastes better too with the skin on?

I eat a ton of salt, but I have the opposite problem, low blood pressure, so I need the coffee and salt to feel normal.

CaliValleyGirl said...

Those do look yummy! The baby was having a lot of colick, so I cut dairy out of my diet too....*sniff*...Your recipes look delish and just what I needed to kick the no-dairy blues!

Anonymous said...

High blood pressure seems to run in my family (the eating habits probably don't help), but so far, I've always had really exceptionally good readings.

Maybe it would make sense to cut out the coffee for two or four weeks, get another bp reading, and then decide whether to keep it or leave it? I used to adore drinking coffee regularly, by the way; I started loving it with lots of cream when I was about 3. (Yes, my parents were nuts to let me. It was a big joke in my family that I'd always drink coffee with the adults.) But after not having it for about 18 months, even though I still enjoy the taste and smell of it (now that I can have it again), it makes me jittery like crazy if I drink the caffeinated kind, especially if I add sugar. So I'll have a small bit of decaf now and then with lots of hazelnut milk in lieu of cream, and it's much more satisfying than a reliant habit.