Healthy Never Tasted So Good!

 Around here, we love good cookin! And as Summer rolls in, we do more and more of our cooking on the grill!

I've never been a big fan of fish but I've perfected a recipe for Applewood Smoked Tilapia that has warmed my heart to this great source of nutrition.  So what's on the menu?

Applewood Smoked Tilapia with Tropical Salsa, Grilled Garlic Asparagus & Garden Salad. Healthy never tasted so good!

To begin this simple, yet elegant, meal, we'll need to fire up the grill! I prefer charcoal but gas would do; either way, you'll need a moderately hot fire. Begin soaking the applewood chips, but they won't go in until it's time to put the food on.

As the grill is heating up, prepare the Tropical Salsa.

Ingredients:
6 ounces fresh pineapple
4 ounces fresh mango
1/2 navel orange
1/2 sweet onion
1/2 mild bell pepper
1 tablespoon Emerald Coast Espresso Balsamic Vinegar (or infused balsamic of choice)
Pinch of sea salt

Dice fruits and veggies into fine pieces, sprinkle with sea salt, toss with balsamic, cover and refrigerate.

For the entree I used tilapia filets, brushed lightly with extra virgin olive oil (evoo), and seasoned with sea salt and lemon pepper. I grilled it over direct heat until it was no longer translucent, about 5 minutes per side, and then moved it to indirect heat and closed the grill to allow the applwood smoke to fully flavor the fish.

The asparagus was trimmed and marinated for 15 minutes in evoo, sea salt and minced garlic. This was also grilled over direct heat until it was just-tender and slightly charred, 5-7 minutes.

Serve Tropical Salsa topped Tilapia topped with the asparagus and a garden salad for a delightful summertime dinner!

And there should be plenty of the salsa left for a great addition to your next chicken or pork dish!

The Big Red Dawg

He went on his first big truck ride on Christmas Eve, riding on the Dog Box in a 40 lb Conagra chicken box. He was one month old, swaddled comfortably and perfectly content riding in that old Freightliner.

When he got a little older, he would ride with his daddy some during the summer break from school. They'd pull out and his tiny hands would wave out the window of the big truck and I'd smile and choke back tears and wave till they were out of sight. When they returned, he'd climb down talking and his eyes would shine as he told me of his adventures. I'd listen, mesmerized, and his face would light up as he talked about seeing snow for the first time or listening with his Dad to Louis L'Amour on audio books. He was growing up comfortably content in an International CabOver.

His Dad came off the road and started driving local, so his trips were curtailed. He finished high school and went off to college and when he came home, I'd listen to him talk about riding home in a line of truckers. His face would light up as he described those big Peterbilts with their chicken lights and smokin stacks and I knew ... I knew that no matter what he did in life he wouldn't be content until he was back on the road.

The other night I sat in the passenger's seat of his big truck and listened as he told me about his adventures from California to Florida. I watched his face light up as he talked about seeing the sun come up in Montana, and hiking after a deer in Colorado and walking through the snow in North Dakota. And I listened to him talk about throwing tarps and riding ruts and sleeping with the curtain down.  I sat right there in that seat and he sat right there in that sleeper and 20 years melted away and for a minute he was my little man, perfectly content riding that truck.

My Trucker Tony in The Big Red Dawg. There has never been a prouder Mama.

As you go about your daily business, I ask that throw your hand up and wave and smile at that Trucker you pass. Show a kindness to that hard working, hard driving man or woman. And remember to drive safely around them because their spouses and lovers and family and kids ... and their Mama ... is waiting on their safe return.

PERSPECTIVE

Photo credit: http://www.metmuseum.org

Times are tough money is tight the economy is broken. My 14 year old has heard this poor mouth probably as long as he can remember.

Yesterday - as many days - I had the opportunity to listen to an elder farmer chew the fat about the Old Days (it's actually one of the perks of my job). This gentleman said something similar to what I've heard dozens of times before but ... his words stuck with me. I couldn't shake them. All day I kept hearing him say, "I'm 78 years old, been on my own since I was 14..."

Did I mention that my Young Son is 14? I asked him this morning, "Can you imagine being On Your Own?" For a moment he had a twinkle in his eye. No doubt ... thoughts of being his own master, never having to clean his room, staying up all night if he chose ... I'm sure those ideas ran through his mind. Briefly. The twinkle dimmed as the gravity of the idea sunk in. Over the course of 15 minutes we had one of the best conversations we've had in a while.

So the elder farmer was on his own at 14, in rural Alabama, in 1950. Pictures of soda shops and bobby socks do not come to mind.

I try to imagine my Young Son rising with the sun to go to work till dark in a field or a lumber yard - walking barefoot there and back. I try to imagine him cooking the squirrel he shot for dinner over a fire and sleeping under the stars.

I try to imagine him working for $3 per day. I try to imagine myself working for that - and trying to get by. And it not being enough. And having to let my 14 year old go On His Own - because I can't afford to feed him.

But here we sit in America in 2014 lamenting that times are tough money is tight the economy is broken. Because we're struggling to make the mortgage AND pay the housekeeper. Because we can't get a new car this year. Because the kids have to use last year's iGadget.

Because we're spoiled and ungrateful.

Because we fail to appreciate what we do have.

Because we're so caught up in things that we sometimes forget people.

We forget what real struggle is. We send our kids to school in their Fifty Dollar Jeans and Hundred Dollar Shoes and we cry over how hard we had to work at the office just to make those ends meet. We don't think about how fortunate - or blessed - we really are.

Maybe we need a change in Perspective.