BBQ Sandwiches with Baked Sweet Potato Fries

I'm not huge on anything with barbecue sauce.  In fact, there is only one time in my life I've had anything with barbecue sauce on it that I liked that I didn't make and tweak myself.  We'll not discuss that one time, the place in question that served said barbecue sauce on their food closed down and broke my heart and it just...It hurts too much...I can't.

This is also another one of those "What do I do with all the fajita-seasoned skirt steak I bought on sale" posts.

Back to business.

Put the fajita-seasoned skirt steak into your crock pot on high...If you don't have one a regular one on the stove over medium-high will be fine.  This is about half a pound uncooked and it made 3 HUGE sandwiches.

Add in about 2 cloves of chopped garlic.

About 1/3 cup of your choice of BBQ sauce.

About 2 tablespoons or so of Worcestershire sauce.  Worcestershire is a word I can not say in real life.  True story.

...And top it all off with about 3 or 4 tablespoons of honey.  Make sure its the real thing, not that weird "honey-flavoured syrup"...stuff.  Add just enough water to where it almost covers the meat, put the lid on, and let it stay like that for about 3 hours or until the meat starts to fall apart.  Keep adding enough water so it doesn't dry out or burn, but if it cooks down and gets thick then that's good and will make your life easier later.

Now, here we're missing some pictures because I got impatient.  Cut up a large sweet potato.  Or more depending on how many people you're feeding.  I only made enough for the two of us because if I'd sent them with the Wookie to work with that extra sandwich I don't know how they'd hold up to travel and microwaving since they are rather tender, so, yeah.

De-railed myself again, damnit.

Cut up the potato french-fry style and put it, a little at a time so they all get covered, into a zipper baggy with about 1 tablespoon of olive oil and a sprinkling of salt and rosemary - but be careful on the rosemary, it can get strong fast - then shake it all up so they get coated.  Repeat with more potato/oil/spices until you're out of potato, then line them up on a cookie sheet and pop them into the oven.  The oven that you should have preheated to 450.  You know.  Yeah.

So that meat in the crock pot?  If that hasn't cooked down to a shredded mess with a thick-consistency sauce, then we're about to fix that.  If it did cook down to a shredded mess with a thick-consistency sauce, then you can skip this part and you had more foresight than I did.  The potatoes should cook in about 20-25 minutes, so while they are going, add the meat (shredding it the rest of the way with a fork or tongs if necessary - I was on a time crunch) and whatever juice is left to a pot large enough to hold it, put it on your stove over high heat, and keep stirring until whatever juice is left has turned into a thick consistency sauce.

Now we're talkin'.  Take that off the heat to cool so the sauce can thicken a bit more, lid on.

When your fries look like that and are soft when you probe them with a fork, then they're done.

Now, for my sandwich, I used the end of a baguette and tore the bread out from the inside so I had a nice, hollow crust.  Greedily devour the parts you took out.  Yes, this is a required, necessary step.

Stuff it with the beef, serve it with some fries.

The Wookie prefers his on regular bread.  I sometimes mourn for his taste buds' lost sense of adventure.

Oh yeah, and dessert was banana pudding...Sugar free, low calorie, low fat with LOTS of banana slices.  Mmmm.

<3
The Wookie Wifey

Goodness on Rice

I have no idea what to call this dish.  It was born out of necessity and turned out to be so incredible that I can not wait to cook it again.  Its one of those dishes that really doesn't look so hot, but it tastes like absolute Southern Heaven.

First,  you need about a half pound of skirt steak that is pre-seasoned for fajita meat.  Or you could just use regular skirt steak and season it yourself.  Also, start out with a large pot.  I started out with that one thinking it would be enough, but since I'm an idiot it boiled over and I had to switch and then wash TWO pots.  I'm a fucking genius, you'll catch on to that.  Put that puppy on high.

Add one small, chopped onion and about 3 cloves of minced garlic.  I didn't take a picture of that...See "fucking genius" statement above for explanation.

Anywho, let that shit boil for about 3 hours, or until the skirt steak starts to fall apart.  Don't forget to keep adding water, just enough to cover things is fine.

Once it looks about like the above, its time to add this:

Mmm...Mustard and turnip greens.  Once these are in the pot, leave it on high and keep doing the whole "add water" thing.

Next, its time for rice.  Since I don't have a fine mesh strainer, I used the toe of some unused stockings I mauled and turned into leggings, which worked great...The leggings and the strainer.

Rinse the rice through the stocking, (or your mesh strainer if you're lucky enough to have one), until the water runs clear.  Then, soak the rice in some water for 30 minutes.  After that, let it drain.  I tied the stocking to my faucet for the draining.  Be sure to let it drain well, because you don't want more water in when you cook it than you think.  Unless you want soggy rice.

After that, cook the rice as normal.  I used 1 cup of rice, 1 3/4 cups of water, a dash of salt, and a tablespoon of olive oil.  After it has cooked, let it rest, covered, for 30 minutes.  This does make a huge difference.

Once your rice is almost rested, your greens and stuff should have boiled down to where everything is nice and shredded and there is only a bit of excess water, like so:

Once it looks like that, add a packet of brown gravy mix and stir it all up well.  Take it off the heat and let it stand, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes so it can thicken and turn into the awesomeness it is destined to be.

Plate it up, and there you go.  This is the only shot that wasn't blurry since it smelled soooooo good and I was in a huge hurry to start shoving it into my face.  This stuff will probably, sooner or later, be named a sin by the Catholic Church.  Its.  That.  Damned.  Good.

Would love feedback if you give this a shot. 

<3

The Wookie Wifey