4th of July Grilling Extravaganza

4th of July always brings beach, fireworks, and grilling. In celebration of this fun summer holiday, I wanted to put together a grilling extravaganza. I made skewers of all sorts for a crowd of 13 people. To start the meal, my girlfriend made delicious deviled eggs. I would give the recipe, but it's a family secret and I've been forbidden from divulging it.

I will divulge the rest of the meal! I made 3 different types of skewers: rosemary and garlic steak with grilled tomatoes, tarragon and lemon mako with grilled peaches, and chicken, eggplant, and onion with peanut sauce. To accompany this, I made potato salad and watermelon salad. 

For the steak skewers, I pureed rosemary and garlic in olive oil and marinated the steak in the oil all day. I then coated the tomatoes with the rosemary - garlic oil and salt and pepper and put them directly on the grill until they charred. I grilled the steak until medium rare.

For the mako, I pureed tarragon and lemon in olive oil and marinated the fish in that. I put the peaches on the grill without any coating, and let it caramelize. I grilled the fish until firm.

For the chicken, I made a peanut sauce using coconut milk, peanut butter, honey, salt, pepper, garlic, and cilantro. I pureed this, and coated the chicken. I grilled the eggplant and onions after coating them in olive oil, salt and pepper. I grilled the chicken until firm, turning regularly so that it didn't burn on the grill.

For the potato salad, I boiled 5 lbs of redskin potatoes until they were fork-tender. I let them cool off in an ice bath and mixed them with celery, red onion, green onion, cilantro, mayo, mustard, salt and pepper.

For the watermelon salad, I cut up the watermelon, red onion, kalamata olives, feta and served it over mixed greens with olive oil and balsamic.

I also grilled up some burgers and dogs to go along with this smorgasbord of grilled delight. The meal was a hit! Everyone loved the grilled array of food, and after dinner, we were treated to a wonderful fireworks display on the beach in Cape May.