Weekend Cooking: A Visit Back Home

This post is part of Beth Fish Reads' Weekend Cooking.  If you have anything related to food, cookbook reviews, novel or non-fiction book reviews, recipes, movie reviews, etc., head over to Beth Fish Reads and add your post. Or, if you want to read food related posts, head over to read what some interesting people have to say about food. 

 Every year we go back home to the Finger Lakes region and rent a house on Owasco Lake. We spend the week with family and friends and share good food and fun.

The view  of the house from the lake

Our first stop is always Wegmans grocery store, which is one thing I miss about living in Manhattan. We stock up on our favorites, including salt potatoes which are difficult to find in NYC,
and always grab a big package of hamburgers and Hoffman hot dogs (white and red) for the grill. We really miss being able to grill outside every night in the summer!

I always try to combine favorite foods with a new recipe to try out on everyone. This year, I made Mary Alice's Hoagie Dip, which is always a crowd favorite. (Actually, I made two batches this year and they both disappeared.) We also had SoCal Fajita Dip and my son's girlfriend put together a beautiful Antipasti Platter.

Antipasti platter

Cook's Illustrated's Baked Ziti was a popular entree, and we had enough for two days worth, plus some leftovers. I paired that with Balsamic Roasted Potato Salad, and some friends brought a delicious homemade pizza and a huge pan of roasted vegetables that we fought over the next day.

For dessert, we had Pretzel Jello Dessert, Peanut Butter Crack Brownies, and a friend made delicious chocolate chips cookies with her secret ingredient (a package of vanilla pudding).

The biggest hit of the week though was a new recipe- Chicken Spiedies served on a roll. I found this recipe on Pinterest from Mel's Kitchen Cafe , and everyone went crazy over it. People were clamoring for it so much, I had to make it again two days later.

I've made spiedies with the bottled marinade several times, but making it with your own marinade made a huge difference. Several people who had them asked for the recipe and made it themselves already.

I marinated the chicken, but left the boneless chicken breasts whole to grill, instead of threading cubes of them them on skewers. (The purists will not like this, but it worked well for our crowd.)  When they came off the grill, I sliced them and put it in a bowl. People grabbed a roll, piled on the sliced chicken and topped it with the homemade sauce.

As usual, I put together a Pinterest Board with all the week's recipes for everyone who asked for them and I am sharing the board here.

We had a wonderful time and look forward to returning again next year. if you have any summer recipes you like to share with me, send them along in the comments section. I'm always looking for new ones to add to the collection.