BLT hold the L add some O

i don't get paid until friday and i have $10 in my wallet. this does not equate to "fine dining" this equates to "use all the leftover crap in my fridge and pantry." i scrounged around and found the following items:
(1) 4 strips of bacon left over from my mess o' greens
(2) 3 slices of rye bread
(3) a bag of small peeled onions from mike's garden
(4) a tomato from my grandma's garden
(5) 3 potatoes from mike's parent's garden
(6) 1/2 a package of cream cheese
(7) some buttermilk
(8) a few sprigs of dill
(9) questionable bag of a few leaves of romaine lettuce
(10) a nice lil' pickling cuke right out of my garden


whoa! what a bounty! dinner should be no problemo. i decided on garlic smashed potatoes and a blt. to get started i cut up my potatoes and peeled three cloves of garlic for roasting.



i enjoyed a leinenkugel's berry weiss while preparing my dinner because a friend left three of them in my fridge this weekend. it is sweet - very sweet - and i can't really drink more than one at a single sitting. not bad though and the fact that it was free made it that much better.

next i put my garlic cloves in a lil' foil packet with some olive oil to roast.



it is much better to do a whole bulb of garlic (unpeeled) but i was only making potatoes for one so that seemed unnecessary. plus, i only had a few cloves.

here it is roasting away.



if you do a whole bulb you can peel the cloves off and squeeze one end and the warm, gooey garlic oozes right out. ooze it onto some good crackers. YUM!

while the garlic was roasting i started to boil my potatoes and fry my bacon. while that was stuff was boiling and frying away i washed and chopped my veggies. it turns out the questionable bag of leftover romaine was more than questionable. it had seen better days. much, much better days. when your lettuce is slimy it is time to say good bye. poop!
how would i make a blt without the lettuce?

how about a bot - bacon, onion and tomato. sounds good to me!

here are my supplies for the smashed potatoes.



leftover city. i used the buttermilk to make delicious homemade biscuits for my saturday brunch contribution of biscuits and gravy. i used the cream cheese (well, half of this package and two other packages) to make those wonderful bacon wrapped jalepeno thingies as my 'dish to pass' for the annual patio party. (HUGE success again! people freakin' love those things!) and i picked up the dill the other day just for kicks.

i drained the potatoes once they were fork tender and tossed 'em back in the pan. i added the roasted garlic, about 2 tablespoons or so of cream cheese, a lil' buttermilk and some salt and pepper. then i smashed.



next i toasted 2 of my 3 slices of rye bread and shmeared 'em with some mayo. hellman's only please. miracle whip makes me want to puke. plus it isn't even mayo. it's freakin' salad dressing. it was a light shmearing. i don't like too much mayo and when i order blt's out (which i do a lot cuz it is my favorite sammich) i always ask for the mayo on the side.

then i constructed my bot. here it is missing its top half.



and here is the finished product.



i topped the smashed potatoes with some of the chopped up dill and as a side i enjoyed the rest of the tomato and some slivers of cuke. i paired this meal with a 312 - one of my favorite wheat beers (especially after i visited the brewery in chicago last year!)