Grill your way to greatness: 6 recipes that will energize you

Grill your way to greatness: 6 recipes that will energize you

Summer is the perfect time to fire up the grill and spend time outdoors. Next time you grill, try one of our 6 best grill recipes and enjoy the taste of summer!

The highlight of the grill: the best meat temperatures

Are you planning to fire up the grill this summer? Want to impress everyone with your grilling skills? Take advice from gourmet butcher himself, Cole Ward, and make sure your meat is at the right temperature before serving it to family and friends. Ward ensures the right cooking temperature for meats, from beef, lamb and veal, to poultry, fish and pork.

Grilled eggplants with mint-coyote sauce and chèvre

Summer is in full swing and many people are making good exploit of outdoor barbecues. Tender grass-fed steaks or free-range chickens are often popular options, but the grilling possibilities are endless. At the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center, a favorite summer dish is grilled eggplant stacks with Coyote Mint and Chèvre sauce. Whether you’re a vegetarian or carnivore looking to expand your grilling horizons, you’ll find this dish makes for an straightforward and filling seasonal meal.

Searching for flavors to fire up the grill

If you enjoy grilling, you probably know that different types of wood give grilled meat, fish and vegetables a delicious smoky flavor; but where will you find them? We’re here to offer some tips for finding the best wood and bark that will add flavor to whatever you throw on the grill this summer (or any time of year). Consider combining these tips with this proven and popular pole to grill the perfect grass-fed steak.

Grilled Nopalitos with Herbs and Cotija

Native to Mexico and distributed throughout the Southwest and California, the prickly pear or nopal cactus Opuntia fig-indica, is a stunning, drought-tolerant landscape plant, a natural barbed wire fence, and a source of nutritious food – both the rootstock and fruit are edible. Inside the prickly pads lies a cooling, slimy pulp that tastes like green beans. In Mexico, “nopalitos” are often grilled and served in tacos, boiled and marinated with garlic, herbs and crumbly cheese, or scrambled eggs.

How to cook the perfect, tender grass-fed steak

Give your taste buds an ethical treat: fry some grass fed! You’ll probably pay a little more for your t-bone, but you’ll be supporting tiny farmers and those who benefit the most amiable to the planet possible cattle breeding methods. In fact, if you support really well-run grass-fed farmers, you don’t have to feel guilty at all. After all, haven’t you heard that cows can save the planet? That’s true…

Grilled asparagus and shallots

This Independence Day, keep things straightforward with a deliciously fresh plate of grilled asparagus and onions. Carl Legge, author of, among others, Permaculture kitchenshows in the recipe below that tasty does not have to mean time-consuming.

Happy Urban Dirt