Well, without Photobucket, the pictures from the cook just will not post. I will try again and edit this tomorrow if I can get them to download.
For the 20th anniversary, we had our oldest 2 head off to camp. The younger 2 stayed at different friend's houses. My oldest made the comment "There better not be any frisky business!" To which I replied, "You are all gone, of course there will be frisky business!!" Needless to say, she was really embarrassed!
Spent most of the day cooking - dinner was at 6pm so I had to time it to make it all work on time.
The menu:
Ribeye Steaks, .75 lbs each
Sweet Potatoes (in the oven)
Homemade Cornbread
Lemon pepper as well as spicy coconut and Lime shrimp (2 varieties)
Roasted Broccoli
Steak:
Did a dry brine for the steaks - first time I had tried this technique. Overall, turned out well but just a tad too salty. Let it sit for 4 hours, then come to room temp before putting on indirect heat. Got it to rare temp, basted it with some "beef Love" (basically just melted suet) and then seared it to get some good char marks on it.
Homemade Corn Bread:
In the cast iron - came out pretty well. It was slightly underdone but the flavor was pretty good. I had forgot to add the butter so I ended up pouring it on the batter while in the cast iron and trying to stir it in. I think I overworked the batter because it was a little dense. I will definitely be trying this again!
Shrimp:
I ended up buying the large shrimp (13-15 count) so I misjudged how long it would take to cook. I did 2 flavors - Lemon Pepper and the Spicy Coconut and lime flavors. To me, the soy sauce in the coconut shrimp was too strong and the coconut not enough. My wife - absolutely loved them. I was not a big fan, but then that does not really matter. I will have to tweak it some though.
Roasted broccoli :
Nothing major about this - though, I again failed to follow directions. I put the lemon juice on prior to roasting them. They did not crisp up and were too much flavored with Lemon. Again, my wife said she loved them (though I did notice she only ate a couple!)
Overall, cost was a lot less than I would have paid at a restaurant. It took quite a bit of time, but it was worth it. I did overestimate how much we would eat though - this was a lot of food! Somehow, my wife found room for a little popcorn later on at the movie.
