Thirsty Thursday: Watermelon Margaritas (Virgin or Non)

When my mom was pregnant with me, all she ever wanted were cherry shakes from our local Dari-Kup.  Lo and behold, I too have an addiction to cherry shakes.  So I feel relatively certain that our future baby is going to LOVE watermelon, because I have been eating it non-stop all summer.  No lie--I finished off a 5 cup container of it today over the course of about 4 hours.  I can't necessarily call this an irrational "craving", as watermelon has been my favorite fruit my entire life...but I'm definitely eating more of it this summer than usual.

Question:  Do you sprinkle salt or sugar on your watermelon?  My grandma always did salt, but the Hubs tells me he's only seen people sprinkle sugar.  That just seems silly--watermelon is usually plenty sweet, and the salt makes that sweetness really pop.

I guess I should be glad--there are FAR WORSE things I could be craving (and have...I made a batch of no-bake cookies two nights ago just to fend off a craving...and we won't even talk about how many Sonic Slushes or Kum & Go Coolee's I've had in the last few months).  After all, watermelon is 92% water and contains a goodly amount of Vitamins A, B6 & C, along with lycopene...and there's only about 200 calories in that 5-cup container I just downed.

Sadly, no matter how fast I seem to eat watermelon, since my Hubs is not a huge watermelon fan, that means if I buy a full size melon, I have to eat it all myself...before it goes bad.  That MAY not be an issue this year, but any other year we almost always end up having some that goes bad or we have to freeze it for smoothies.  
  
If you've got a watermelon addiction like me, or need to use up a bunch of melon before it starts to go south--here's an awesome option to help beat the summertime heat!  These watermelon margaritas are perfect for sipping on the porch while your husband grills...or while a tiny alien kicks the crap out of you from the inside. :)

INGREDIENTS: (makes 2-4 margaritas, depending on your glass size)

• 4 cups fresh (or frozen) watermelon
• Juice of 4 limes (or about 4 Tbsp)
• 2 Tbsp sugar (or Splenda/Stevia to taste--DON'T use the full 2 Tbsp if you replace the sugar, both are WAY sweeter than sugar & don't require as much)
• 4 cups ice (if you start with frozen watermelon, you can skip this)
• 1/2-1 tsp salt (to taste--I like a little more because it makes the flavors pop)
• salt & lime wedge for garnish (optional)
• BOOZY VERSION: Add 1-2 oz of good tequila to each boozy-rita

DIRECTIONS:

Combine the first 5 ingredients in a blender & pulse until smooth, then pour into glasses (or hey, mason jars) & garnish (if you do the salt on the rim thing, you'll have to do that in advance--just wet the rim with lime juice & then dip the glass in a shallow tray of salt---or hey, sugar if you'd rather. I won't judge.)  For the boozy ones, stir in the tequila post-blending (or if you're making a full batch of boozy-ritas, add it during the blending process).

Add a straw and ENJOY!

Watermelon, Mint & Feta salad

I am a newb gardener.  Let’s just get that out there in the open.  My mother was blessed with a green thumb.  My Grammy growing up always had a huge garden that we would help water, and she’d let us grow a few seeds in our own little section of plot, but even back then, the only thing I could ever get to grow were root vegetables—radishes & turnips.

Over the years, periodically I would make an attempt at getting something to grow, like a watermelon plant or a small herb garden, but they never took off. Probably because I wouldn’t take the time to water them, and would forget they existed for weeks at a time.

But after I got married, I started pondering on the movie “28 Days”, and the end when Steve Buscemi is telling the group when they might be ready for emotional relationships again. “First, you get a plant.  If it’s still alive at the end of a year, you get a pet.  If, by the end of the second year, both are still alive…then you can start thinking about a relationship.”  Of course, if my case, it was more “baby” than relationship.  I figured I should probably know how to keep something green alive that only requires sunlight & water before I had to try to keep a whole other human being alive, too.

So, in the first year of our marriage, I had a bamboo & re-grew some green onion tops in a windowsill. 

In the second year, I took potatoes for a whirl, along with some rosemary & a tomato plant.  The potatoes didn’t thrive, but I got enough for a shrimp boil.  The rosemary did great, and the tomato plant struggled at first, but once we put it into a larger pot, things turned around for the better & we got a couple months’ worth of grape tomatoes out of it.

This year…I have squash, mint, basil, three types of tomatoes, rosemary, garlic, and I recently started some romaine & celery from store-bought ends. 

I had a cucumber in a Topsy-Turvy, but I don’t think it was getting enough sunlight so it’s no longer with us. (RIP, Japanese cucumber.)

Our patio garden.

Oh, and I still have the bamboo & green onions.

So far, most things are growing well…some things a little TOO well.  I guess I should have read a little more about which plants are compatible for growing together in a pot… I bought rosemary, mint, and basil at the same time, and put the rosemary in a pot by itself, and the mint & basil together in a large pot.  But apparently, mint doesn’t play well with others.  It’s a bully, and it chokes out everything near it.  So I’ve been spending the summer trying to keep my mint under control so it doesn’t kill my basil. Because Basil > Mint, in my culinary world.

Of course, upon this realization, I also then realized…what in the world am I going to use all this mint IN??? I rarely cook with mint.  However, my friend Ruben made this awesome watermelon-mint salad last Fourth of July, so that was the first thing I decided to make.

This is perfect for your upcoming Fourth of July BBQ!  Super easy to throw together.  It’s also great for tailgating—we went to a ball game earlier this month, made this ahead of time, and brought it in a gallon Ziploc bag in our little cooler.

 

INGREDIENTS:

1/2 seedless watermelon, chunked

1/4-1/2 cup chopped mint

1/2 cup feta crumbles

juice of 1/2 lime

salt & pepper to taste

 

DIRECTIONS:

In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients and toss well.  While it’s great even just a few minutes after making, if you let it sit over night the flavors will combine even more.  The lime, salt & pepper are optional, but the acidity adds another layer of flavor, and the salt & pepper can really make the flavor of the watermelon pop.

 

Thirsty Thursday: Frozen Watermelon-Lime Margarita

Maybe I’m a cheapskate, but frozen fruit is expensive.

So I like to stock up various fruits when they’re in their respective peak seasons at super-cheap prices, and then freeze them myself. 

Example?

A 14oz package of Dole frozen strawberries can go for $2.50 at Wal-Mart.  OR---I can buy a 16 oz carton of fresh strawberries for 99 cents, wash, hull & halve them, and then freeze them myself.   That’s a 12 cent per ounce savings.  And with the recent popularity of “green” and fruit smoothies, there are probably families out there spending at least $10-20/month just on pre-frozen fruit and smoothie mixes.  For the upper end of this scale, these families could save up to $144/year just by freezing their own when things are on sale.  Aldi’s constantly has random fruits under a buck—and as I’ve mentioned before, if you don’t like the quality of the produce at Aldi’s, you can get Wally-World to price match it.

ANYWAY… this also means I have a veritable crap-ton of fruit in our freezer right now.  Which my husband likes to remind me of, because it’s taking up valuable retail space where more manly things, like meat and ice cream, could be. Because the two shelves filled with everything from chicken tenders to elk steaks apparently isn’t enough meat.  (…love you, honey…) ;-D

This weekend I organized our freezer and decided it was high time to use up some watermelon (I went a little crazy when they were marked down to $2.99 for a large seedless).  Did you know you can freeze watermelon???  I didn’t, until this summer.  Granted—it’s not so great for “freezing then thawing” uses, but if it’s intended to remain in a frozen state (think frozen yogurt, smoothies, granitas, etc) then everything is peachy-keen!

You know what I like in a frozen state?  Margaritas.  And when you use frozen fruit?  No ice needed.

 

Ingredients:

2 cups frozen watermelon

juice and pulp of one lime

2-3 tablespoons sugar (start with 2, then taste & add more if necessary.  The amount needed will depend on how sweet your watermelon is.)

1/3 cup tequila

pinch of salt (optional, but I think it makes the flavor of the watermelon pop)

 

Directions:

Combine the above in a blender and pulse, using the “ice crush” setting.  Pulse until no large chunks are visible.

Wet the rim of a glass with lime juice, and then dip in a shallow plate/bowl of sugar.

Garnish with lime slice & straw.

INHALE. Savor on your back porch as the sun sets on another weekend.

Makes two small (10 oz) margaritas (or one big @$$ one).

NutriFacts:

Calories 190.1

  Total Fat 0.7 g

  Saturated Fat 0.1 g

  Polyunsaturated Fat 0.2 g

  Monounsaturated Fat 0.2 g

  Cholesterol 0.0 mg

  Sodium 3.5 mg

  Potassium 199.6 mg

  Total Carbohydrate 23.1 g

  Dietary Fiber 0.9 g

  Sugars 20.8 g

  Protein 1.1 g