Oh, Summer! You are right around the corner and it feels SO GOOD!

In other exciting news, it’s official! We had our first real outdoor BBQ of the season this last Sunday and it was oh. so. wonderful! I made another winner of a dish from The Scramble* (gasp!). My sister was in town from San Francisco so we invited the family over to share in the food, and fun, and yum!

Suffice it to say that the meat alone was a huge hit. I will definitely be making this pork again this summer!

XX, Megan

Ingredients for Pork Dish
1 1/2 – 2 lbs. pork tenderloins, or use boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 lime, (use 3 Tbsp. juice and 1/2 tsp. lime zest)
2 Tbsp. fresh cilantro, chopped (optional)
1 1/2 Tbsp. brown sugar
1 1/2 Tbsp. canola or vegetable oil
2 tsp. curry powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. black pepper

Marinate

Because we were having a large gathering for our BBQ I doubled the pork serving to just over 3 lbs. and consequently doubled the marinade, so if you’re making a six serving dish, you may not have nearly this much meat!

Place the pork loins into a shallow baking dish with sides. Juice the lime, zest the lime, chop the cilantro, and mix these with the oil, brown sugar, curry powder, salt and pepper in a small bowl. You can marinate your pork for as little as 30 minutes and up to 24 hours. I think I marinated mine for 12 hours and the flavor was magnificent!

Grill

Once your meat has marinated to your liking. Grill the pork for 20-25 minutes, flipping once. Once you flip, I would recommend watching the meat closely. Pork is super dry when overdone.

Mix

If you are making a side salad, you can throw it together while your meat is grilling. I chose to use harvest grains instead of rice for a side, either option is delicious!

Next time

The Scramble suggests a savory side of grilled artichokes to compliment your pork tenderloins. However, the artichoke selection in our little town wasn’t to my liking, and I didn’t have time to run to the “big city” to grab the artichokes. Next time we head outside for a BBQ I will DEFINITELY be doing up these grilled artichokes. Don’t they sound absolutely yum!

To add the artichokes to your meal, prep the meat as instructed above. About 10 minutes before you are ready to begin grilling your pork stem the artichokes and start them steaming in about two inches of water. Steam artichokes for 20 minutes. Pull them out of the water and let cool (alternatively, you can run them under cool water to speed up your process).

Mix 2 Tbsp. of the oil, all of the salt, and 1 tsp. of the garlic in a small bowl. Your pork should have hit the grill about 10 minutes prior to this step.

Slice the artichokes in half from top to bottom. Remove the fuzzy choke near the bottom with a spoon. Baste with oil, salt, garlic mixture. (The Scramble recommends doing this in a bowl so you can use the leftover oil for basting mid-grill.)

Grill the artichokes for 5 minutes each side until it begins to show spots of char. Remove from grill and squeeze juice of 1/2 lemon over all.

Lastly, as your pork and artichokes are finishing their time on the grill. Mix together the aioli sauce with 1 tsp. of the remaining oil, 1 tsp. garlic, 1/4 cup mayo, and juice of 1/4 of the lemon.

Grilled Artichokes with Aioli Sauce 
4 baby or small artichokes
3 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp. kosher salt
2 tsp. minced garlic, (about 4 cloves)
3/4 lemon, juice only, about 3 Tbsp.
1/4 cup reduced-fat mayonnaise

EAT!

*The Scramble is a meal planning service to which you can subscribe here. For a fantastic price you will receive 5 weekly meals which means 5 recipes (main course plus a side dish), complete grocery list, the ability to tweak the number of people you are making for, and full nutrition facts. PLUS tips as to how best to PREP your meal beforehand, add a punch of FLAVOR, and how to SLOW COOK almost every recipe if you’re especially slammed that night. This wonderful service really does live up to it’s name. You can come home at 6 p.m. and be sitting down to a DELICIOUS, HEALTHY, HOME COOKED meal by 6:30 p.m. most nights.

Look at these two awesome little creators about to get their color on. The sunglasses were upon request. “It is toooooooo BRIGHT to look at you!” And don’t worry. Mr. M switched his out for red later on because he can.

Today we’re talking about the COLOR spectrum on our Science Friday post. Thanks to our awesome Kiwi Crate subscription.

A COLOR spectrum (the following is the unscientific definition) is a band of color like you would see in a rainbow. This spectrum is produced when light is broken into its composite colors according to the different degrees of refraction. Kiwi Crate put together an awesome project to TEST the color spectrum of some of the color.

We set out to find out what colors blue, orange, gray, green, and brown looked like when broken into their spectral parts! Come along and check it out!

First, as always, we gathered our supplies. Of course with Kiwi Crate this is a cinch! Everything came in our crate but the WATER!

Mr. M is holding 5 cups to hold the water, a pack of parchment paper rectangles, a set of markers, a length of rope, a packet of clothespins. These last two items aren’t part of the experiment. They will be used to beautifully display your findings!

Second, we lay out the hand-dandy “mess mats” Kiwi Crate included and got to work. We filled each cup with water. Each child got five parchment rectangle. We folded each rectangle in half and colored a thick, bold strip of color right next to the fold in the middle of the paper.

Then we put one end of the paper into the water. Allowing the colored section to hang out.

Third, we waited for the magic to happen. This took a minute or more. So it felt like we waited for a long, long time ;).

Fourth, we talked about the colors we saw that were “appearing” as the original color we had markered on met up with the water. Then we circled the colors on the spectrum that we saw.

Fifth, we tied our ropes together, and strung them along the porch. The kids helped to carry the pieces of paper over and we carefully attached them with the clothespins to the rope.

Sixth, we have now dubbed our home The Rainbow Palace. Said with a bright, shiny, mystical voice. The Rainbow Palace! Have a totally awesome Friday!

XX, Megan

P.S. Kiwi Crate is geared for kids ages 4-8. If you happen to have older kids, you should also check out Kiwi Crate’s NEW line of crates for older children. Tinker Crate, and Doodle Crate. If you happen to have younger kids, check out Koala Crate! This post is not sponsored or in partnership with Kiwi Crate. We simply love the product! Thanks!