We had good friends over on Saturday night, and the meal I made was pretty darn yummy.  I believe Brian said it “rocked”.  I thought I would post the meal, since it wasn’t too hard to pull off.

T-bone steaks with horseradish sauce:
Steaks are best grilled when they are close to room temperature, so take them out at least a half hour before grilling them.  To prepare, I usually put Montreal Steak Seasoning and some worcestershire sauce on them and pierce all over with a fork.  This tenderizes them, and also pushes the spices into the meat.  Let them sit for a bit and then they are ready to grill.

The horseradish sauce is made by mixing 1/2 cup sour cream, 2 TBSP mayo, 1 TBSP worcestershire sauce, 2 TBSP milk (or cream), 2 TBSP prepared horseradish.  You can also add salt and pepper.  This is a “throw together” recipe, so I don’t have exact measurements.

Roasted butternut squash and carrots with goat cheese:
Peel and cube a squash and small bag of carrots.  Place on jelly roll pan and splash some olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper over the veggies.  Mix them all up so they are coated well, then make sure they lay in a single layer.  About an hour before the rest of the food is ready, put in a 400 degree oven.  Halfway through cooking, turn the pieces.  When done, place in a serving dish and mix with crumbled goat cheese.  Yummm.

Grilled Sweet Red Peppers:
Easy – just cut the red peppers into big pieces and toss with olive oil, salt and pepper.  Place on grill with the steaks and cook on both sides.

Mixed greens salad:
Toss together mixed greens, slivered almonds, diced strawberries and some feta or goat cheese.  I forgot to add the cheese, but I had planned on adding feta.  For the dressing, I just mix 1/3 cup olive oil, 1/3 cup red wine vinegar, 1/8 cup sugar, salt and pepper.

Easy fruit salad:
Of course you need this for the kids.  I used the rest of the strawberries from the salad and cut up bananas.  Just add a little sugar and lemon juice and mix together.

I had pretty much everything prepared and ready to go before they got there.  I just needed to mix the veggies with the cheese, add the dressing to the salad, and cut up some bananas and mix the fruit salad.  I love not being held captive in the kitchen when everyone else is enjoying the outdoors.  Instead of steak for the kids (since mine won’t eat steak), we had hot dogs for them. 

Oh, and the five kids were playing outside until 11:00 pm.  Kai actually slept in until 8:30, but Anya got up at 7:30.  We were really hoping for longer!