ice cream social.

you may have detected from my party post that i really don’t get out much these days. i am totally fine with that.. but i still like to see my friends regularly. my solution? make them come to me!

last night we had some friends over for a BBQ and ice cream party. the ice cream was my friend jessica’s idea and the rest just came together because our mothers taught us we should eat dinner before dessert.

a few items for snacking before dinner..

veggies~

homemade sun dried tomato hummus~

to make this, i combined 2 cans of garbanzo beans along with some of the liquid from the beans, a big spoonful of tahini, 6-7 sun dried tomatoes, salt, pepper, mrs. dash tomato basil seasoning, trader joe’s 21 seasoning salute and 2 cloves of garlic.

falafel chips~

i picked these up at sunflower market and LOVE them. such a tasty change from regular tortilla chips. fair warning: my friend amber thought they tasted like healthy cardboard. can’t please them all

mango salsa~

when everyone arrived i got to work on the fish.  it was bring-your-own-meat and i picked up some mahi from the local fish market. i get my fish from aquarius fish which is downtown salt lake city. my friend CJ’s parents own it and so i always have the inside scoop on the freshest fish that day. CJ knows way more than any human should know about fish. i definitely use that to my advantage.

i seasoned the mahi with a roasted garlic peppercorn rub and then basted it in olive oil before throwing it on the grill.

grillin’.

chillin’.

simon couldn’t decide what kind of meat to grill, so he got every kind there was.

i threw together a salad with romaine, spinach, craisins, slivered almonds and feta.

i also baked some alexia sweet potato fries and garlic parmesan wedges.

what i love about fish is that it cooks so quickly! in a matter of minutes the mahi was ready to eat! i served mine over the salad with a side of trader joe’s raspberry vinaigrette.

the mahi was so good. remember my seafood-hating husband who agreed to start eating fish?? well he loved it so much that he had to text my fish market friend CJ to tell him how amazing it tasted!

after eating, it was time to get to work on the ice cream. i mixed up a double batch of ben & jerry’s vanilla bean ice cream—the best recipe EVER. thank goodness teri sent me the B&J recipe book.

teamwork!

waaaaiting for the ice cream to freeze…

40 minutes later, the ice cream was ready to eat!

what is ice cream without a couple toppers? earlier in the day, i had mashed up a carton of strawberries with a bit of xagave and let them sit in the fridge for a few hours. i also baked a batch of baker’s one bowl brownies.

my bowl.. a big huge scoop of ice cream topped with strawberries.

we managed to polish off all two quarts. i think it’s safe to say everyone had a belly ache from ice cream overload. it was so good that you just couldn’t stop eating it.

after dessert there were a few serious rounds of jenga.

jenga gives me anxiety! but at least i never lost.

after everyone left, the dogs were spent and so were we.

last night was a whole lot of fun! thanks for coming to me, friends, since i am too lazy to go out anywhere these days…

want proof? i just woke up from a 2 1/2 hour nap and don’t plan on leaving the couch for the rest of the night. well, unless it’s for food, of course.

i have my priorities.

see ya later!

xo. janetha g.

p.s. the renew life probiotic winner is #11, kerri lagendyk! congrats, please email me your mailing address.