Traveler's Wife: BBQing in Peru

I love to entertain and play hostest even when we are traveling abroad! This time we are staying in a fully furnished apartment with plenty of room which is something I'm not used to. It's a new experience living in a third floor apartment right off a major road! I'm not too thrilled with the road noise but the view really makes up for it. Also cooking in a euro style kitchen makes me miss my "small" kitchen at home! Here are few pics from our little BBQ. I'll explain more with the pictures.

My favorite dish for the BBQ! I'm not sure if it was because it tasted so good or because of the presentation! I used Paula Dean's Asparagus with Lemon Butter you can find the recipe on my pin board....http://pinterest.com/pin/207376757811756069/

My first time making pasta salad from scratch! I have to admit I love the suddenly salad mix but it wasn't available in Peru. It's a must when we BBQ and I found several recipes and came up with this. I guess the portion on most of this, but it ended up great! I cooked the pasta according to the package then mixed in the following, 1 can/package of chopped black olives, 1 diced cucumber, 2 diced tomatoes, 1/2 red bell peper diced, 1 cup of chopped mozzarella, and a small bottle of italian dressing. I added a bit of vinigrette to it. YUMMY!

The biggest hit with the guest were these tortilla wraps. They had never had anything like them here. I used a the Fiest Pinwheel recipe. http://pinterest.com/pin/207376757811756094/

The perfect dessert to for any BBQ! This desert is from several recipes and I've altered it everytime I've made it. I usually make it with a pound cake but that wasn't available here in Peru, but vanilla cakes were! I crumbled up half the cake for the bottom layer. Then I poured half a can of condensed milk over the cake crumbles. The night before I sliced up 1 kilo of strawberries and mixed in a cup of sugar. I let that sit over night to have some juice sweet mixture to pour over the crumpled cake and condensed milk. For the next layer I whipped together whipping cream adding a tablespoon of sugar. I repeated everything to create the layers. This to was a big hit and I swear it's the easiest and quickest dessert for any summer gathering! P.S. I purchased the bowl at the grocery store, Metro and it's is so coming home in my suitcase!

I wanted to bring some flavor from home and decided on dirty rice. I made this from scratch too! I'm really getting proud of myself using old family recipes. My grandmother makes things all the time but never has a recipe out. I always ask her to give me the recipe for what she is making but she says the only way I'll learn is to cook it. So after years of watching her cook I'm finally learning the recipes! Dirty Rice is pretty easy and can be made the day before. I made this with chicken gizzards and liver. I'm also practicing writting out recipes so bare with me! I'm just as informal as my grandmaw taught me. I chopped up the liver into very small pieces and browned it with bacon fat. I chopped up the gizzards then blended them for a minute in the blender. I added the gizzards to the pot and continue to brown all the meat. I waited to untill they started sticking to the pot to add the veggies. I chopped up and added 2 stalks of celery, 1 red bell peper, 1 onion and 3 garlic gloves. I let them brown a for a minute with the meat. Next I added chicken stock and water to cook the rice. I used 4 cups of uncooked rice and 4 cups of chicken stock and 4 cups of water. Let that boil for a minute then turned it off and covered it for awhile. Did I mention this was my first time without my grandmaws help! PHEW it turned out YUMMY! I love southern cooking and love it even more when I get to share it with the world!

Well I should have snap this picture before pouring some glasses, but you get the point. Also had to do some editing to the recipe. Lots of what I make at home aren't available here. At home I make my sangria with concentrated apple and orange juice. Peru isn't a fan of frozen items. I decided to just go with Burgandy wine with fresh fruit slices (apple, orange, lemon) a little triple sec, sugar, and a 1/2 cup of apple juice and 1/2 cup of orange juice. I let about 2 gallons sit over night and the next day it was delicious!!