Jaanipäev

In Romania on the night of 23-24 of June we are celebrating the Night of Fairies, in Estonia
is John's Day. In Estonian language is called Jaanipäev and as an Estonian person told me, they celebrate the light and sun. In the last 5 years we used to celebrate traditional Estonian way with a bonfire and a big grill, a lot of people and we party until morning but this year we decided to stay home and have a small grill and chose to have more time to rest after a very busy period in the restaurant.
Here I show you how we spent the day cooking a simple meal. Before we started preparing the big meal we had a snack platter with some different cheeses (brie, blue cheese and cedar), marinated olives, peanut butter and some mix nuts all to complement a cold glass of rose wine for a summer day.

The olives I marinated them with rosemary, lots of garlic and good olive oil and leave to marinate for 2 days.
With the garlic, when you thing is too much, then double the quantity for a nice aroma :)

Then we started to prep the meat for grill. For the pork ribs we used only salt and pepper because after they were cooked on the grill, we covered them with a smoked BBQ sauce. For the pork neck I chose a Mexican marinate with taco spices and extra chili and oregano and we put them on skewers. On beef entrecote steak we put just salt and pepper for a natural flavor but be sure the beef is aged and good quality for a tender meat. And of course some chicken fillets for kids.

To complement the meat we marinate the boys in  a local corn beer and we used some fresh vegetable to grill like mushroom, eggplant, peppers and zucchini which I marinated them with olive oil and seasoning. As well I sprayed them with some BBQ sauce. Then we made a cold sauce with sour cream, garlic and herbs and one spicy sauce with curry and cocos milk.

As a garnish for the grill we made two different salads, one is a Mediterranean potato salad with onions, marinated cucumber, oregano, seasoning and virgin olive oil and the second salad of tomato and white cabbage.

                                                             And then we grilled.

                                                            And then we eat.

After a long pause and more beer we had dessert. Bianca made this very good dessert with salted nuts, peanut butter and cream cheese filling  and sour cream frosting.

Recipe for the cake will follow soon.
We had a great day! Pin It Now!