Monday, May 30, 2011

"Pamping" Spread: Hamburgers, Hot dogs, and Chicken and Shrimp Kabobs

I found this new word for "camping" but it's not really camping when you're staying in a cabin and you're provided with a gas grill to make food--you have a bathroom and a jacuzzi tub... a nice warm bed. 

"Camping" means catching food with your bare hands and bringing it home to cook over an open fire. Today, we're "pamping" and making the usual bacon cheeseburgers and sausages. Our cheeseburgers are layered with munster and smoked gouda slices. Sidenote: I never shy away from an opportunity to bring up my favorite dog, which is a "Chicago dog". Traditionally, it is a all-beef frankfurter with yellow mustard, chopped white onions, sweet pickle relish (should be bright green almost neon), a dill pickle spear, tomato wedges, pickeled sport peppers (look kind of like a lil peppercino), and seasoned with celery salt. I tried to make my "hobo" version by dressing up my sausage with tomatoes, onions, a pickle, and mustard with no ketchup. It was delicious but still not the same.

The kebabs or kabobs were nothing fancy. I had prepped them before our trip. Taking good ol' dark meat: Rinsed with salt water and sliced chicken thigh meat and skewering them. Also, I bought some really good shrimp (25-30--meaning 25-30 shrimp per pound, is how they're referred in the deli/fish dept) . I made sure they were shelled, deveined and then I skewered them up and seasoned them with my favorite: Lemon pepper and garlic salt.

Now, one of my favorite things to do is get creative with the leftovers. Our first morning we had the pleasure of having Belgian waffles with strawberries, and bacon and breakfast sausage.  We had plenty of bacon leftover... enough for dinner the next night and breakfast the next morning. Now, my mom taught me how to make scrambled in the microwave.


Scrambled Eggs (Using a Microwave)
2 eggs (at a time works best--I also did 4 eggs at once*)
a little bit of water
Take a microwavable bowl (I used a paper one). And crack the eggs into the bowl and scramble--adding a little bit of water (about a teaspoon). Put it in the microwave and heat uncovered for the first round 1-2 minutes (*For the 4 eggs at once, I had to do it 2-3 minutes to start.) Then remove the bowl from the microwave and stir. Then place in the microwave again and heat in 1 minute increments until the scrambled eggs are fluffy and fully cooked.
And voila! I cubed up my leftover hamburger patty with cheese and mixed it with the scrambled eggs for a Cheeseburger scramble. Also, to my disappointment, the coffeemaker in my cabin was broken. Luckily, I had coffee, a coffee filter and a hot water pot. I made my own "hobo" cup of coffee by pouring hot water over a coffee filter with coffee that I rubber-banded to my paper cup. It was perfect!
See! Pamping isn't so bad... you just roll with the punches;o)

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