When you're unemployed, it's always the weekend!

So my friend Henry, an extremely talented director, is having a small screening of his latest movie at his house this Sunday, so he can get some feedback from some friends and colleagues (I saw an earlier cut, the film is great!) before finalizing his film.  Henry and his beautiful wife Eva (a great photographer as well as a great actress) have been huge supporters of my blog, and I was honored when Henry asked if I would mind making some Caveman appetizers for the get together, instead of serving pizza, chips, or the usual fare.  Being in between jobs (careers?), I have nothing but time on my hands, so I jumped at the chance to cook some finger food for a dozen or so people.

We decided on a menu the other night, and today was all about shopping, and prep work, so that once Sunday night comes, almost all the work is done already.  The menu includes some old favorites, and some recently new experiments.  Henry took one look at the Coconut Shrimp photo, and wanted that one as a definite.  Next, those onion rings from last night!  I already had two salads with the thousand island dressing after tweaking the recipe a little bit, it's outrageous!  I'm also making the Kale Chips.  Not sure if I talked about them in the blog, or on Facebook, but it's easy, crispy and delicious.  Kale leaves drizzled with olive oil and the Holy Trinity (black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder), baked at 350 for 20 minutes.  Makes you feel like you're eating potato chips.  And finally, Sliders! Not sure how ambitious I want to get with the fixin's, but even if it's just the mini-burger on rosemary bread, and Caveman Condiments, I think it'll make a great snack.

Four dishes total, one beef, one shrimp, and two purely vegan, in case we have people with freaky eating habits (he said as he wrote his freaky eating habit blog).  Plus, some dessert!  Recently I have discovered the Date.  So friggin' good!  And despite being super sweet, they have less sugar than honey!  To me, they taste like caramel.  So I wrapped dates around almonds and walnuts for little sweet bites.  But the highlight of the night will be this item I conceived while watching "The Next Food Network Star."  I try to play along at home, as if I were competing with my Cooking Caveman show (which plays nightly in my head).  One of the contestants had to create a dish inspired by romance.  I immediately thought of chocolate covered strawberries, and started to think of a caveman friendly substitute.  So I wrapped dates around fresh strawberries, and they look and taste like caramel dipped strawberries!  My friend Julie and I had one the other night as a test.  Oh yes.  Oh yes.  I chose wisely!  Lord, I know I'm single and unattached now, but PLEASE let me have a little hottie to feed these to come February 14th!  Instant score!!!!!

I spent today shopping, and then wrapping dates around the goodies (they'll keep well in the fridge until Sunday night... I hope), making the ketchup, mayo, tweaking the thousand island until it was perfect, making the rosemary bread, and pre-cooking the sliders rare, so that when I reheat them Sunday night in the microwave, they'll be cooked perfectly.  Tomorrow morning I have to get some stuff at the Burbank Farmer's Market and make a new batch of the dipping sauce for the Coconut Shrimp, and then the rest can be cooked before the guests arrive Sunday night.  Whew!  I hope I get a real job soon, I'm friggin' exhausted!  But there is something wonderful about spending all this time cooking.  It's a good feeling, almost zen, like gardening.  It sucks I'm unemployed, but a blessing I have the time to do something I love.  I won't bother taking pictures now, Eva is a pro, so I'll let her photograph the food on Sunday night herself.  Tune in Monday to see how it all turned out.

Speaking of dipping sauce, all this cooking is making me hungry, so let's feed this Caveman, and use up the last of the old batch of dipping sauce.  As a reminder, I made it to go with the Coconut Shrimp by throwing 3 peaches, 1 jalapeno, 2 cloves of garlic, a healthy spoonful of honey, grated ginger, and onion powder into a blender, and it was so good, I didn't even need to cook it (but I did heat it up a little).  Well, tonight we're going to use it to glaze chicken wings!  Remember, make sure it says ORGANIC, because free range chicken could mean a lot of nasty things, but by law, chickens labeled organic are happy hens, right up to the point where they're slaughtered and I devour their carcasses (which makes for happy Cavemen).  Just going to marinate the wings in the sauce for a few hours, and then roast them in the oven for an hour at 350, over a bed of sliced rutabaga (drizzled with olive oil and the Holy Trinity).  The sweet sauce will drip down with the good chicken fat and cook those yummy root veggies perfectly!

I'm also going to attempt to deep fry some spinach again.  I saw this on "Best Thing I Ever Ate" (another Food Network favorite show of mine), and it looked fascinating.  The chef served it over veggie lasagna, part decoration, partly to add crunchy texture to the dish.  I tried it the other day, and came close, so hopefully I'll come a little closer tonight.  Okay, just tossed the spinach into the oil.  Note to self: run from the stove the second the spinach hits the oil, and keep skin graft specialist's phone number handy.  Scalded skin aside, it's friggin' delicious!  Dark green and beautiful.  Hit them with a little Holy Trinity and you're done.  Crazy, but to me, it tastes like potato chips (much like Kale Chips)!  Not sure they work as a side dish though, they would have to be part of a bigger dish, something moist, because they're so dry.  Something like... veggie lasagna.  Duh.

The whole meal is cooking now, can you smell it?  Mmmm.  I wish you could.  The chicken is going to be scrum-dilly-icious!

Okay, it's ready, thanks for waiting (if only real cooking was this quick).  Take a look:

Caveman Like?  Yes, Caveman like.  When I was a kid, we always had chicken on Friday night (it's a Jew thing, even though if you remember last Friday I made pork chops, so shhh, don't tell the rabbi), and when I think to make chicken on Fridays, it reminds me of my grandmother, which is a nice feeling.  She did all the cooking in our house.  Food was a huge part of our relationship, and despite the fact she never cooked with jalapeno, I still feel connected to her with this meal.  And I'm sure if she were alive today, she'd smile and say to me, "Ugga-Bugga."  Only she'd say it in Yiddish.


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