My kitchen and dining room look like a disaster area.  The outdoor “kitchen” counter needs a scrubbing.  There is one log on in the campfire pit still smoldering.  My trash bin is full…as is my recycling bin.  And despite drinking a gallon of water yesterday (or very close to it), my head has a low-grade throb going on.

Just a few of the effects of having friends over to deep-fry a whole bunch of food.  So, what did we actually get to cooking up?

• Lamb chops (GF)
• Potatoes (GF)
• bacon-wrapped tator tots (some with jalapeno) (GF)
• bacon (GF)
• chicken drumsticks
• Phyllo Pockets
• Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough with Jalapeno hot dogs
• Brownies with bacon
• calamari (GF)
• corn-on-the-cob (GF)
• Cheeseburger Balls (GF)

And then there were just the regular snacks:

• GF Chips & salsa
• Cheese & GF crackers
• relish tray (Bread ‘n Butter pickles, Pickled beans, pickled peppers)
• Feta Cheese and red grapes

I wasn’t terribly disappointed that I couldn’t try everything, the gluten-filled items were fried in a separate dutch oven and put on separate plates.  In a way, it saved me from overeating and I honestly filled up on pickles.  I had one bite/piece of all the gluten free items, and then had a lot of rum punch, and switched back to water for the end of the evening.  The chickens enjoyed the corn cobs and any remaining tasty bits on them.  

This time we didn’t batter nearly as many items, instead opting to fry many things in their natural state to see how they turned out.  I really liked the bacon and the bacon-wrapped tots with jalapeno.  The lamb chops were PHENOMENAL!  Mr. Muses “Cheeseburger Balls” (originally he called them “bites”, but they grew much larger than a “bite”) were okay though the dough created a huge shell and the “burger” cooked down creating a meat rattle.  Funny, tasty but ultimately might need to go back to the drawing board on that one.

So where does that leave me today?  Cleaning up.

But now that I’ve down another huge glass of water, I think it’s time for some breakfast… that isn’t fried.