The Perils of Penelope . . . pineapple, that is.

When I wrote in my last post :

 Stay tuned to find out the fate of Penelope Pineapple.  Will it be the grill, the blender, or something more sinister?! 

I didn’t actually intend to blog about the pineapple in my refrigerator.  BUT, dinner tonight was so good that I just have to share!  Not only was it really good, I didn’t ruin my calorie count eating it.  Sorry, it was not the grilled desert (but here is the link to my favorite gilled pineapple/desert), not the blender, it was the chopping block!  (Insert evil laughter here.)  

Grilled Tuna with Pineapple and Rice

This recipe fed my family of three with a lot of left-overs.  (Yum, I can’t wait for lunch tomorrow!)

First the tuna (2-6 oz. Steaks).  I marinated it for about 30 min. in the following ingredients.  A zip bag with the excess air pushed out works really well.  With the bag you don’t need to make a huge amount of marinade to cover the steaks.

• 1/4 cup Olive Oil
• 1 TBS Soy Sauce
• 2 TBS Lemon Juice
• 2 Cloves Garlic smashed
• 2 Tsp Grated Ginger Root

While the tuna marinated in the fridge, I started the rice cooking.  (Mini Rant:  DO NOT USE INSTANT RICE!  If you are bothering to cook real food, cook some real rice while you are at it!)  I used 2 cups (rice cooker size) of Jasmine rice (my fav!) and used a can of low sodium/fat chicken stock and added water for the rest of the liquid.  (Using low sodium/fat stock lets you control the amount of these ingredients in your food.  You can always add more if you want it.  It is not a diet thing, just a good cooking habit thing.)  I also tossed some minced onion (1/2 small), and ginger root (1 TBS) in with the rice.

While the rice was cooking and the tuna marinated, I chopped up the following:

• 1/4 Pineapple in 1″ chunks
• 1 Orange in 1/2 ” chunks
• 2 TBS Fresh Cilantro 
• 2 TBS Fresh Parsley
• 2 TBS Fresh Chives

(Some red pepper would’ve been nice, but I didn’t have any.)

By now your rice is well under way and you can grill the Tuna.  4 min. each side over high heat.  (The grill must be preheated.)  When rice and tuna are done, chop the tuna into bite size chunks.  Toss tuna, rice, fruit, and herbs together and add:

• Juice of 1/2 Lime
• 2 Tsp Olive Oil
• Salt and Pepper

And toss again.

Serve with Soy Sauce or Nuoc Mam on the side.  I prefer Nuoc Mam myself, nothing like the salty sweetness to go with the ginger and pineapple!  What is Nuoc Mam?  Vietnam’s all purpose condiment made from anchovy extract, salt and sugar.  One of those things that is WAY better than the sum of it’s ingredients.

And now the Mom’s are out there saying, “Grilled Tuna!  My kids/husband will never eat that!”  But they will. Really.  My son has remarked that last two times I have served tuna “Mom, how come tuna tastes like chicken?”  I don’t know the answer to that (in part because it doesn’t taste like chicken to me), but I do know he eats the tuna with less complaint than chicken!

So, there it is; the first post about the pineapple in my fridge.  Tune in tomorrow when our villain will say, “Smoothies anyone?”

A Slow Day

There is little to report today.  We are still waiting for our home study renewal package to come, it should arrive tomorrow.

 I spent most of the day in theatre storage packing props for the move.  This whole process promises to be exhausting.   Right now we are packing and moving all props and costumes to a lounge adjacent to the storage area.  The painters are right on our heels as we empty each room freshening everything up for the campus archivists to move in.  We can’t yet move our things into our temporary space because it is not yet ready.   This would only be half as frustrating if it weren’t for the fact that we will need to move everything again next summer.  Boy do I hope the new building is ready!

I picked S up from school and let him play briefly with his friend, but not for long.  Very chilly and damp today.  S is very excited about summer vacation and he asked about vacation as we walked home.  We looked on-line at Busch Gardens in Virginia since he said he was interested in the beach.  He was not really thrilled with what he saw and seemed much more interested in Colonial Williamsburg.  Fine by me, I’m more interested in Colonial Williamsburg too!  Well, one thing let to another (as on-line time frequently does) and next thing I know J is walking in the door and I haven’t even thought about dinner yet.  I had to work fast because S had his scout graduation tonight.  I grabbed some frozen quesadillas, tossed them in the oven.  In the fridge, plain left over white rice (I LOVE MY RICE COOKER!) and reheated it with a can of black beans from the pantry and a few seasonings.  Wow, what a good really fast meal it turned out to be.  It kind of blew my calorie count for the day (over by 300 ) but I did more physical work today than normal and cold damp weather always cranks up my appetite. It will probably even out just fine.  We finished up with enough time for homework and a little play time too.

Off to scout graduation.  Which was nice, not too organized, but under an hour!  Home, snack for S and bed!

Tomorrow, more mundane things, but hopefully I can get out to buy flowers for the yard.  The weather man says it will be a nice day.