Day 54-- Beef and Bell Pepper Kabobs and Cheesy Potato Skins recipes

Prologue:

Sunday nights are my favorite cooking nights, since my boyfriend and I tend to make a big meal to eat before or during True Blood.  Tonight's menu was Beef and Bell Pepper Kabobs and Cheesy Potato skins.  He took care of the beef kabobs and I took care of the potato skins.  If you chose to cook them together as a meal like we did, pay attention to the cook times and start the potatoes first.  For that reason I'm listing them first.

Cheesy Potato Skins

Prep time: 5 minutes + 10ish minutes later

Cook time: 40 minutes + 5 minutes

Total time: 1 hour 5 minutes

Servings: 3-4

Ingredients:

4 brown potatoes (try to use rounder ones)

11/2 cups sharp cheddar cheese

3 slices of bacon

1/4 of a red bell pepper

1/2 of an onion

1 clove of garlic

3 teaspoons of butter

Directions:

1.) Pre-heat the oven to 425 degrees, after washing your potatoes, place them directly on the rack and cook for 40 minutes.

[at the 30 minutes mark, start the beef kabobs.  They should take about 30 minutes start to finish]

2.) As your potatoes cook start chopping up your 3 slices of bacon.  Place in a pan around minute 30 of your potatoes cooking.  While that cooks, chop up your 1/4 of red bell and half an onion (use the rest of them for either kabobs or an omelet in the morning).

3.) Once the bacon is done add the onion, bell pepper, and garlic to the pan and cook until the veggies are soft and cooked all the way through.  Meanwhile, grate your cheese to make about 1-11/2 cups worth.

4.) Once you can stick a fork through a potato without resistance take them out and place on a cutting board.  Cut them all in half and let cool for a little bit.

5.) Once the veggies and bacon bits are cooked bring the pan over to the cutting board.  Cut the halves of the potatoes in half.  Scoop out about 3/4 of the inside of the wedges, and squeeze them a little to make better boat shapes.  *CAUTION*  Will be fucking hot.  Anyway.  Butter the insides with a tad bit of butter inside each wedge.

6.)  Spoon in the veggie/bacon mix into each potato skin and add the cheese on top once done.

7.) Stick back into the oven until the cheese is fully melted.  Done!

Beef and Bell Pepper Kabobs

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 15 minutes

Servings: 4 kabobs (2-3 people)

Ingredients:

1 pound good steak, preferably top sirloin.

1/2 of an onion

1 green bell pepper

1 red bell pepper

salt and pepper

4 wooden or metal skewers

Directions:

1.) Cut into the bell peppers and remove the seeds.  Dispose of the top.  Once done, cut the bell peppers into rough 1 inch squares.  We prefer the red and green bell peppers for color sake, but feel free to use orange or yellows instead.

2.) Cut the onion layers into rough 1 inch squares as well.

3.)  Cut the steak into 1 inch squares and generously season with salt and pepper..

4.) Get out your skewers and alternate sliding down meat, sliding down onion pieces, sliding down peppers, sliding down meat. (this is called "threading" in cooking terms).  You should have about 4 pieces of steak per skewer.

5.) Get out a large frying pan and drizzle some olive oil.  Place the kabobs in the pan and turn occasionally until cooked.  Done!  

Review:

Kabobs are an excellent way of mixing things up for dinner.  They're attractive to look at and even more delicious to eat.  As I mentioned in a previous post, when it comes to steak, pick the good stuff.  I don't care how much you season or marinate, you can't hide a bad steak.  If you're making steak, pick some motherfucking good steak!  You deserve it!  Yummy.... 

I'm glad I tried the cheesy potato skins.  I used medium cheddar cheese, which wasn't quite right, therefore I recommended in the ingredients list to use sharp cheddar like the recipes I've seen online.  The bell pepper and bacon added a real nice flavor.  Cheesy potato skins aren't fooling anybody--they aren't healthy.  But when's the last time you made them at home?...Haha, didn't think so.  I can't wait for left-overs tomorrow! 

Overall I really loved dinner, loved my boyfriend cooking next to me as we listened to Rihanna and Kings of Leon, and loved the latest True Blood episode.  Does Eric have to get his memory back?  I prefer the new Eric.  But that's a whole 'nother entry.  Peace out and happy eats!