Grilled Potato Salad with Crisp Bacon

Submitted by Stacey Hutchings

Mat made this for the High Priest Group Dinner and got rave reviews! This recipe comes from Al Roker's Big Bad Book of Barbecue. We've loved everything we've tried from this book (and we've tried most of 'em)!

For the dressing:
1/2 cup mayonnaise
2 Tablespoons cider vinegar
2 Tablespoons canola oil, or other vegetable oil (we prefer to use light olive oil)
Salt
Freshly ground pepper

In a small bowl, whisk together all of the ingredients. Cover and refrigerate until needed, or for up to 2 days.

For the salad:
4 pounds small (3-inch) red potatoes
6 Tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Coarse salt, such as kosher salt
Freshly ground pepper
6 strips bacon
1 medium red onion, peeled and thinly sliced
1/2 cup chopped parsley leaves

1. Scrub the potatoes, put them in a large pot, and add water to cover by about 2 inches. Salt the water generously. Cover the pot and set it over high heat. Bring the water to a boil, then reduce the heat to a brisk simmer and cook until the potatoes can just be pierced by a fork. The time will vary with the size of your potatoes, but they may take up to 25 minutes.

2. Drain the potatoes, place them in a shallow pan, and drizzle with the oil. Roll the potatoes in the oil to coat, season with salt and pepper, and let cool to room temperature. Cut the potatoes in half, and toss to coat the cut sides in oil. You can do this several hours ahead of time; let the potatoes sit at room temperature.

3. Prepare a charcoal fire or preheat a gas grill for direct cooking over high heat.

4. While the grill is heating, warm a skillet over medium-high heat. Add the bacon and cook, turning as needed, until crisp, 12 to 15 minutes. Remove the bacon from the skillet and drain on paper towels. When it's cool, chop roughly and set aside.

5. Grill the potatoes, turning them frequently, until they are well browned and beginning to char in spots, 5 to 8 minutes. Put them in a bowl, and add the bacon, onion,and parsley.

6. Drizzle the dressing over the potatoes, toss gently, and serve immediately.

Makes 8 servings.

Chocolate Lover's Favorite Cake

Submitted by Barbara Barrow

I found this recipe on www.allrecipes.com years ago. I just looked it up again so I could copy and paste the recipe to a word document and saw that it has a whopping 604 calories per serving! I shouldn't be surprised, but WOW! That is depressing. Enjoy, ladies! If you can:)

1 package Devil's Food cake mix(18.25 ounces)
1 package instant chocolate pudding(3.9 ounce)
2 Cups sour cream
1 Cup melted butter
5 eggs
1 tsp. almond extract
2 Cup semisweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 10 inch bundt pan.
2. In a large bowl, stir together cake mix and pudding mix. Make a well in the center and pout in sour cream, melted butter, eggs and almond extract. Beat on low speed until blended. Scrape bowl, and beat 4 minutes on medium speed. Blend in chocolate chips. Pout batter into prepared pan.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 50-55 minutes. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto wire rack and cool completely.
   

Raspberry Jello Salad

Submitted by Julie Twitchell

This is a holiday family favorite. We have it with Thanksgiving dinner every year. I also brought it to the Roux cooking class for those of you that tried it.

1 large pkg. raspberry Jello
1 pkg. frozen raspberries
1 cup whipping cream with 1 TB of sugar (or 8 ounces of Cool Whip)
1 pkg. cream cheese(8 ounces) at room temperature

Dissolve jello with 2 cups of hot water. Drain juice from thawed raspberries. Keep juice and add enough water to equal 1 cup. Add to dissolved jello. Pour 1/2 jello into a 9 x 13 inch pan(glass looks prettier). Add raspberries and let set in refrigerator. Take remaining 1/2 of jello to wiggly stage and then mix in whip cream and cream cheese that has already been whipped until fluffy. Spread on top of set jellio. Make sure the jello is set before spreading on the topping. If you don't, you won't have pretty layers--but still yummy. This can be made the night before and store in the refrigerator.

Cook's Note: You could use different flavors with fruit too. I think blueberry would be pretty yummy.

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