Beef Salad!

Well hello, my long neglected blog! And blog readers - if any of you are still out there! :)
It has come to my attention just now that my previous post, written waaayyyy back in February, was my 100th post. And I didn't even know it. I was blogging from my phone and never knew.

Sooo, in honor of my 100th post, my 101st post will be about one of my favorite things.

Beef Salad.

Yum.

My Facebook friends have been patiently waiting for me to post the recipe to my husband's delicious recipe. I've tried posting it on here before, but may have gotten the sauce a bit wrong. Let's just say he's had more experience lately in making it so he's pretty much perfected it.

And it truly is perfection. Without further babbling.... here is the "recipe" for our Beef Salad:

The ingredients. (This makes a pretty big batch, probably enough for about 8 big servings):
~ a big, lean chunk of beef steak. Pick your favorite, but not too thick of a cut.
~ fresh veggies. Specifically these:
~ cucumbers
~ bell peppers (I personally think the more colors the better!)
~ red onion
~ tomato
~ mushrooms (fresh. white or baby bellas work well)
~ fresh cilantro
~ fresh, sweet Thai basil. It has a purplish flower at the tip. Might be hard to find outside of an Asian grocery.)
~ Jalapeno or thai chili peppers
~ about 4 fresh limes
~ a few fresh garlic cloves
~ fish sauce (Friendly warning - don't sniff the open bottle. It reeks, but TRUST me, you need this! Here is a photo of the kind we use.)

~ chili garlic sauce (available in most stores, Again, here is the kind we use.)


~ a little white granulated or raw sugar
~ a little salt
~ steamed jasmine rice


Begin by slicing up your veggies into thin strips. Add the fresh cilantro and basil. We usually put them in a couple bowls, and it looks like this when all done:


Next, if you have 2 people, one can grill the steak and the other can make the sauce. If only one person, make the sauce first. Or whatever. Live on the edge and grill first if you like. :) Grill the steak just until it's still a little pink in the middle but no longer bloody. When done, slice it into thin, bite-sized strips. Set it aside if you don't have the sauce ready.

Oh yeah, and don't forget to cook your rice. Not that I ever forget to do that... a-hem....

For the sauce, begin by smashing up the garlic cloves into a near paste-like consistency. Roll your limes to soften them to get the most juice out of them. Or let your kids drop them and play with them while you're slicing the veggies like we do. :) Squeeze the juice into a bowl with the garlic and add about 1/2 cup of fish sauce. Hold your breath if you have to. ;) Add 3 tablespoons of the chili garlic sauce, 1 teaspoon of salt and 2 teaspoons of sugar. If you want it spicier, you can mince the jalapeno or thai chilies and add them right into the sauce.


Once the sauce is mixed up, add the beef strips and marinate them for a bit. Then, add it all to the bowls of veggies and mix it up. Let it sit for a few minutes (if you can, this is the hardest part for me!) to let the flavor develop a bit more. Serve over fresh steamed rice.

Enjoy! And let me know what you think if you try it! :)

Not Me My Husband Monday!

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else* have not been doing this week.

*Or in this case, our husbands. :)



It's been a while since I've done a Not Me Monday post, hasn't it? I usually don't have time in my week to be witty and keep up with everything else going on, but I just couldn't pass this one up. It's not about me. It's not about my kids. It's about THIS man right here:

Nice hair, don't ya think? Although I think it makes him look a bit pale here. Needs Photoshop touch ups, but I just don't have time anymore!

Anyway, without further ado...

Not Me My Husband Monday!

Seth, my husband of nearly six years, frequently has us in stitches without even really trying. Maybe that is what makes it so funny? Here are a few Sethisms. Some recent, some from a while ago. All funny.

* A few Summers ago, he rode his bike to work to save gas. He parked it in the bicycle rack downtown near his building without locking it up. When he returned at the end of the day, his bike was not gone. As in not stolen. He did not call me and I did not say, "Well, did you lock it up?" His reply:
"Well, no! It was parked right out in the open. Buildings with tons of windows all around it. Who would steal it with all those people watching?" It did not take me a minute to reply. I was not at a loss for words at his logic. I guess he forgot to put a sign on the bike stating it was his? :)

* Another time, we were looking in the local swap n shop ads for a kitchen table and chairs. We saw one, but didn't recognize the first 3 digits of the phone numbers listed in the ad and we didn't want to drive too far out of town. Seth decided to call the number and inquire. When the person on the other end of the line answered, "Hello?", my dear husband did not simply begin the conversation with, "Hi. Where do you live?" (and the person at the other end of the line most certainly did not answer him with the name of the town!)

* When visiting my sister in the next state over, we were getting in the car to drive somewhere, and my father was standing over by the kids on my sister's cement slab in her yard(which will someday soon be their garage floor). My dad (aka "Bumpa" to the grandkids) did not trip over some toy the kids had left sitting around, nearly falling over. My husband did not blurt out without thinking, "Oh no! Bumpa took a dump!" (He did not really mean "digger" and the boys did not find this so hilarious that they still giggle about it to this day!)


*Disclaimer:
No husbands were harmed in the making of this post. Hopefully no marriages, either! :) I love you, Honey! xoxo