Plane trip yields meal-prep time savers

When we flew to Mexico for spring break, I was as happy as could be to get to watch the TV Food Network during the several-hour flight. It was a great time to catch up on shows I often don't get to see.

One that stuck with me was "Simply Homemade," hosted by Sandra Lee. Her claim to fame is taking recipes that usually are complicated to make and reworking them so they are fast and easy to prepare.

She uses a lot of store-bought items to get the job done, making her meals semihomemade.

For this episode, she was visiting her old childhood stomping ground, the Seattle State Fair. She sampled all the great fair food she had loved in her younger years: Seattle BBQ Beef Ribs, fried onion burgers, caramel apples and freshly baked scones. She then took the recipe ideas to her outdoor kitchen to re-create them using shortcut ingredients and trimming the calories.

For instance, she boiled the ribs for an hour before grilling them. That rendered out a lot of the fat and tenderized the beef. The nice thing about doing this is that it can be done the day before you're planning to serve them.

Then on grilling day, pop the ribs on the grill and slather them with her semihomemade barbecue sauce: Take your favorite store- bought sauce and jazz it up with molasses, vinegar and coffee. She had them on a medium grill for only about 10 minutes to heat them through, giving them a smoky flavor.

I really liked her idea for the fried onion burger, a recipe I vowed to download and use often during the summer. Instead of frying the onions, she grilled them.

Every time I've grilled onions, they've separated and the loose rings have fallen through the grates. Lee cut the onions into thick 3/4-inch rounds, laid them flat and inserted long toothpicks horizontally through at least half of the onion. This prevented them from falling through the grates.

Brush them with oil and season with salt. Grill 5 minutes on each side or until softened, remove the toothpicks and serve.

For the burgers, she took 2 pounds of ground beef and mixed it with 1/4 cup store-bought barbecue sauce and a teaspoon of McCormick's brand Montreal Steak Seasoning.

Then she shaped the burger into four balls. She poked a deep hole in each ball and filled each with 1 1/2 tablespoons grated sharp cheddar cheese. The ground beef was molded back around the cheese to enclose. Then the balls were flattened to a thickness of about 3/4 inch and grilled to the desired doneness, about 5 minutes per side.

Instead of making caramel apples, she made Caramel Apple Salad. It was super easy. A head of butter lettuce was separated into leaves and arranged on a platter. The leaves were topped with three Granny Smith apples that had been cut into wedges. She drizzled about 3/4 cup caramel ice cream topping over them and sprinkled them with 1 cup chopped walnuts.

Finally, she made Stovetop Scones, which were cooked in a cast- iron skillet on the grill.

Here's that recipe and the full rib recipe.

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Reach Farney at 636-0271 or teresa.farney@gazette.com.

She appears Tuesdays on KOAA's

Comcast Channel 9 at 4 p.m.

SEATTLE BBQ BEEF RIBS Yield: 4-6 servings

1 rack beef back ribs (about 3 pounds total), cut in half

1 teaspoon seasoned salt

1 cup vegetable broth

1 cup apple juice

2 cups store-bought barbecue sauce

2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar

2 teaspoon molasses

1 teaspoon instant espresso or 2 tablespoons strong brewed coffee

Sliced green apple, to garnish

Procedure:

1. Place ribs in large, heavy pot. Add seasoned salt, broth and apple juice plus enough water to cover ribs and bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer gently until meat is tender, about 1 hour.

2. Using tongs, remove rib racks from pot. Cool slightly. Cut between bones into individual ribs. (Can be made to this point 1 day ahead. Cover and refrigerate.)

3. Preheat grill to medium heat.

4. In bowl, combine barbecue sauce, vinegar, molasses and coffee. Brush ribs with some of sauce. Grill ribs until brown and thickly glazed, occasionally turning and basting with more sauce, about 10 minutes total. Garnish with green apples.

SOURCE: "Semi-Homemade with Sandra Lee," TV Food Network

STOVETOP SCONES

Yield: 8-12 servings

4 cups baking mix (recommended Bisquick)

2 tablespoons sugar

1 egg

1 cup milk

1 tablespoon vegetable shortening

Procedure:

1. Preheat a cast-iron skillet or griddle over medium-high heat.

2. Combine baking mix, sugar, egg and milk in medium bowl. Mix gently. Form a ball and knead dough gently on floured surface 5-8 strokes, until dough holds together. Pat or roll dough to form 6- inch circle. Cut dough into 12 wedges.

3. Grease pan with shortening. Reduce heat to medium and add wedges of dough. Cook 4-5 minutes, adjusting heat and repositioning wedges until they're an even pancake-brown. Flip and cook another 3- 4 minutes.

4. Serve with raspberry jam and sweet butter.

SOURCE: "Semi-Homemade with Sandra Lee," TV Food Network

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