The Dark Sky Was Worth It

Shish-kebabs, also kepab, kabab, kebob, kabob, kibob, kebhav and kephav according to wikipedia. Are a dish that originated in Persia as fried, not grilled, meat. The kebabs (or kepabs, kababs...) weren't originally served on skewers they were in fact a wide variety of dishes. Everything from large and small cuts of meat to ground meat and sandwiches, (hence the wide variety of names anyone)?

Tonight's kepabs are the standard americanized version. Cyrus (wait a minute, that's the name of a Persian king and Sun God and my brother) is making a main course of sirloin tip, cherry tomato and potato kababs. These wonder kebobs will be followed by our families ever-present grilled fruit desert. But this time it'll be different. Imagine a kabob with fresh strawberries and cubed mango, grilled. Better yet put that in the middle of your plate and drizzle some hot fudge onto the top of the already wonderful kibob.

My mouth waters just waiting for it.

You can smell the sirloin tips now. Marinating in olive oil and spices. The sky is clouding over and dad and Cy are hunched over the grill starting a fire. The potatoes are parboiling and Frank Sinatra is calling from the speakers. What would we do without Pandora "internet radio"?

The kebhavs are on the grill now getting smoked out beneath the lid. Dad is slicing the mango (which, being a produce broker, he bought, sold and bought again. Odd paradox.) for our desert kephavs and Cy is skewering the strawberries and mango cubes. The smell of smoky sirloin and grilled tomatoes fills our house, and no doubt our neighbor's houses too. The main course skewers are almost ready and the spur-of-the-moment shopping decision naan (an Indian flatbread) is being coated in olive oil to heat up on the grill. I can't wait.

And I almost forgot about the Phizzini (see March 28th post) fixin's we got at IKEA the other day, lingonberry juice concentrate, that we will mix with club soda.

Our main course is done and the sky is getting darker by the minute. This isn't 6:30 PM in late May. At least it's not totally dark, I've never seen brighter, happier, colors as the red-gold combo we just put on the grill. But we must muddy it with the dark of the chocolate sauce like oil has muddied the waters of the gulf coast.

Amazing. The last kebabs were perfect. The strawberries and mangoes just slid right off the skewers and they were slightly warm, near to bursting with warmed sugary fruit juices. Mmmmmmmm. The dark sky was worth it. I'm glad we ate outside