Jeans & Barefoot

Growing up in the south tea comes one way when you order it, and that's sweet. If you want unsweetened you have to ask for it!

I never had a recipe for Sweet Tea. I didn't even know there was one besides tea bags (4 or 8 depending if you use the big or little ones), sugar & water. That's all there was (and is) to it! I also never knew anyone that couldn't make sweet tea. That's pretty much unheard of (that I thought at least until I heard & read people say that they are born and raised in the south & don't know how to make sweet tea. I have even been told at a fast food chain here that they didn't have a MACHINE to make sweet tea..since when do machines make sweet tea?!?)!

So if you don't know how to make sweet tea here ya go! From a true blue southern girl!

4 big tea bags or 8 little ones (I use Lipton)
A pot of water (a sauce pan)
1 1/3 cups sugar
1 gallon pitcher (or jug)

Boil the water on the stove. Once the water boils turn it off and take it from the burner. Put the tea bags in. Let them sit for awhile. I don't time how long...long enough that the water is dark brown & the tea bags haven't busted (and aren't close to busting), and the water is still warm enough to dissolve the sugar. I would guess about 15 or so minutes.

While the tea is steeping put the sugar into the pitcher. You can use an old milk jug too...that's what my grandma used to do! Once the tea is ready pour the tea into the pitcher & stir until the sugar is dissolved..or pretty close to it! Now that its mixed up, fill the rest of the pitcher with cold water.

Get a glass of ice, pour in your tea & enjoy!!

We have had this recipe quite a bit and it's always a hit! We have made it both on the grill and in the oven, in a pan or wrapped in foil packets and it's never failed! It's a go to when we have company. I usually make a little extra sauce if we don't cook it in foil packets for dipping! When we make it in foil packets I wrap them individually, each person gets their own packet (and their own dipping sauce). When I bake it, depending on the thickness of the filets, I bake about 20-25 minutes.

It's quick and easy! Halibut can be pricey but we are fortunate enough to have a freezer stocked of fresh caught halibut from the summer! We have also used Salmon and rockfish instead and it's just as tasty!

So here's the recipe...

Ingredients:

• 1 pound halibut steaks
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• salt and pepper to taste

Preparation:

Believe it or not I firmly believe that cooking IS easy!

I have always been in the kitchen in one way or another..making meatballs with my dad, grilled cheese & ramen noodles were my specialties at my grandmas. Eventually my interests grew and grew, now I like to try all kinds of new stuff!

What makes cooking easy?
1. If you can read, you can cook!
That's really the biggest part! Get a recipe {even hard ones} and read it...all of it...first! Then as you move to each step, read it again, and the next step to know what's coming up next!
2. Start simple and work your way up!
Don't start with Prime Rib and homemade Garlic Mashed Potatoes as the first thing you've ever cooked! Start with a      
pasta dish {they are usually really hard to destroy}. Add things each time..a side dish, adding some meat, mixing        seasonings & spices, making your own sauce. And yes making your own sauce is easy too!
3. Don't stress about it!
Cooking can be fun {and rewarding} so have fun with it. So what if you spill something or make a mess or use every dish in the house, it can all be cleaned up eventually! Burn something? Dinner tastes horrible? That's OK!!! Trash it and move on. Don't let a messed up dish ruin your day. I have recipes that I have tried once and it didn't turn out good and thought it was me so I tried it again and it was still messed up. It wasn't me it was the recipe!
4. Always be willing to try again!
If I gave up at the first dish I messed up I wouldn't be cooking today! Didn't taste good? What's it missing? Tweak recipes to your tastes. Recipes, to me, are just suggestions on how to cook that dish. We LOVE cheese in this house, so when a recipe calls for 1 cup of cheese it usually means the whole bag of shredded cheese! Cooking something that calls for spicy...make it more or less depending on what you like.