Community Corner

Some Great July 4 Holiday Cooking Ideas

If you can't decide what to make, the following information may help.

When it comes to cooking for the July 4 holiday, grilling is at the top of the order.

But what to grill? And how? And how much? 

I profess not to have too many ideas, since I don't grill much myself. But I've come across a few places for recipes, cooking tips and other information that might help make your planning a lot easier than mine. 

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AllRecipes.com is a great place to go for just about anything food-related, but this Grilling 101 primer is ideal for newbies and veterans alike. There are recipes for everything from barbecue beef, pork and chicken to kabobs and steaks. 

If you want go easy on both meats and calories, then Cooking Light's grilling guide is an ideal resource. Some of those recipes do look rather substantial, too. Is all this too good to be true?

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The healthy grilling stampede isn't lost on the folks at Epicurious, who have a boatload of recipes to choose from that won't leave you, your family or your guests bloated. 

In the debut of Because Ya Gotta Eat, East Cobb Patch contributor Jeannie Caryn offered up a plethora of , including all kinds of vegetables. If you're looking to grill those instead of the oven or stove (and it's going to be roasting hot weekend), then give it a shot. Zucchini, onions and mushrooms on the grill are most succulent!

I'm not much of a sweets eater (just give me a good ol' fashioned bowl of strawberry ice cream!) but and Cobb Tots & Kids founder Brooke Stanchie passed along this superb recipe for raspberry creamsicles that she found in Family Fun magazine. 

I reproduce it here because I can't imagine a more fitting way to top off a holiday feast and stay cool at the same time. Happy Independence Day!

 

Ingredients

 1 pint raspberries

1/2 cup sugar

1-1/4 cups water

1/2 cup cream (heavy or light)

1 tbsp. lemon juice

1 cup vanilla yogurt8 (5-oz.) waxy paper cups

8 Popsicle sticks


1. In a blender, puree 1 pint of the raspberries with the sugar and water. Then use a jellybag or sieve to strain out the seeds (this should yield about 2 cups of pulp).


2. Transfer 2/3 cup of the raspberry puree into a separate container, add the cream, andwhisk well to mix. Meanwhile, have your child stir the lemon juice into the rest of theraspberry puree. Now you should have two containers of raspberry sauce—one that'sdeep red and another that's creamy pink. Chill both sauces.


3. In a bowl, stir together the vanilla yogurt and the remaining raspberries (another goodjob for kids). Pour the mixture into the paper cups until they are about half full. Set thecups in an 8- x 8-inch pan (for ease in transferring them in and out of the freezer). Covereach cup with aluminum foil and poke a Popsicle stick straight through the center of thefoil and into the mixture. Freeze until set (about 2 hours).


4. Remove the foil and pour a layer of the deep red puree on top of the frozen yogurt.Freeze again until solid (about 2 hours). Finally, pour a layer of the raspberry creammixture into each cup and freeze until solid. To serve, peel the cups away from thecreamsicles. Makes 8 creamsicles.


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