Feeding the Servants

Our daughter Catherine is President of Lutheran Campus Ministries at St. Matthew's Lutheran Church in Charleston.  A couple of weeks ago, she was part of a group of about 22 that took part in a Servant Weekend in Aiken.  They put a whole new roof on a house, and worked in a food pantry, among other things. They left to go back to the Holy City on Sunday morning, and had to pass within a couple of miles of our house, so we invited them over for a lunch. Now these are young adults from The Citadel and the College of Charleston, and when we feed such college kids we generally try not to provide food they'd get in the cafeteria or the local pizza joint. This is the second year we've done this so we kinda-sorta had good idea of what they'd like. This is the menu we offered:

Pork Chops

Rice & Mushroom Gravy

Deviled Eggs

Grilled Squash

Kale Casserole

Brocolli Salad
Weaver D's Sweet Potatoes
Green Beans

Lime Jello-Pineapple Salad

 Slow Roasted Roma Tomatoes with Feta & Olives

Sour Cream Dinner Rolls

Chocoalte Layer Cake with Ganache Filling and White Chocolate Butter Cream Icing

Appalachain Stack Cake

Do-it-Yourself Trifle with Pound Cake, Boiled Custard and Blueberry-Blackberry Filling

Most of these were tried and true recipes, but the kale casserole originally used spinach.  It turned out very well, getting rave reviews, especially from some of the Cadets (along with  the Stack Cake and the Lime-Jello Salad!).  One really cool part was that pretty much all of the veggies and (the blackberries!) were from South Carolina! W. P Rawl's here in Lexington, Beechwood Farms in Greenville county, Callaham's Orchard in Williamston,  and a roadside stand in Marion County.

They got here about 20 minutes earlier than we had planned, but we still got things together pretty much on time.  It was great and they were a fantastic group of young adults!  We really enjoy groups like this. With these guys and gals as our future leaders,  folks, things are gonna be just fine!

Simply Southern Supper

This summer while I was recovering from knee replacement surgery, I had a lot of time on my hands. I watched a whole lot of cooking shows that I wouldn't normally watch. I was also able to thoroughly read and re-read some cooking magazines, cookbooks, and foodie books.

One of the books was John Besh's My Family Table. It is a very good book that I highly recommend, especially if you are cooking for a family. He talks about making family meals that are both simple, fun and delicious. He advocates not roasting a chicken for Sunday dinner, but roasting a whole ovenfull of food: two chickens, a roast, and maybe some side dishes. That way you can have some now, some for leftovers later in the week, and some to freeze for when you don't have time to cook, or to use in other dishes.

I also re-read Donald Link's Real Cajun, and Bill Smith's Seasoned in the South.

Other reading material that I persused well and truly was from the Southern Foodways Alliance's early publications, from their Cornbread Nation series and from their Oral Histories. Celebrating the row crop farmers, BBQ pit masters, all good stuff. With all of this reading and viewing and thinking,  I had a VISION, (choral music from the Holy Grail, please) and a remembrance of long ago.

THE VISION: I came up with a idea for something I like to call Simply Southern Suppers.  The goal would be to simply eat well with friends. It doesn't have to be 5 course meal.  It doesn't have to be gourmet, or fine china. It's just sitting down to the table with good food, good conversation and good folks. It doesn't have to be all good friends. One of our all-time favorite things to do is cook for Catherine & Stewart's friends and cohorts.   Maybe it's just acquaintances who might one day become good friends one day!

The remembrance: Back in 1970's my mother and grandmother made a whole bunch of blue denim placemats. They were fashioned to resemble a pair of jeans and the pocket held a red bandana napkin. I asked Mama Glenda about them, and she brought them down, about 40 of them. She couldn't remember why they got made, but thinks it was BBQ wedding shower for someone. But anyway, they look pretty cool, and I thought they would look great on a red checkered gingham table cloth. However, our dining room table is 14 feet long, and I couldn't find a tablecloth near that big. So . . . . I bought 15 yards of it on sale, and Alice made the tablecloth! Looks real purty, don't it?

So the goal is to have a fairly simple menu, but make it good. If it's a complicated dish, we'd try to do most of it ahead of time so we could just heat it up, or pull it out of the fridge, depending.

Here's the first nights' menu:

Green Tabasco Chicken (simple, 3 ingredients)

Oven Roasted Boudain (very simple)

Pennies from Heaven (made ahead)

Spinach Casserole (assembled ahead)

Sourdough Bread (made that day)

Assorted Pickles

Athena Cantaloupe (cut that afternoon)

Not Fried Green Tomatoes (made earlier that afternoon)

Butter Cake with Mocha Butter Cream Icing (made before and frozen, assembled that morning)

A Good Time was had by all.  It was little bit more than I had originally envisioned, but we're going to work on that.

End of Summer



Well, it's the end of summer.  Peaches are almost gone from SC now, and the ones that you can find are very expensive. They never were really cheap this year, but I did find some deals in July and early August.  The best deal I got was at the SC Farmers Market.  A guy had them for $16 a basket when I got there, and after wandering around for an hour, when I came back by he only had two baskets left.  He was ready to go home so he let me have both for $20.   They weren't the best peaches, due to some hail damage, and they were very very ripe, but I wound up using about two thirds of them, so it was a pretty good deal, maybe, kind of.
Alice pulled up all our tomato plants a couple of weeks ago, and I had good intentions of putting in some patty pan squash plants in their place,  but I let them go too long and lost about half of them.  I might try to plant some again in a week or two, since I had pretty good luck with then last fall. I'm definitely going to try some fall and winter greens. Last year we have very good luck with Swiss Chard. In fact, we still have two plants that were planted last winter.  We occaisionally beat the bugs to them, usually harvesting enough for a couple of salads or sandwiches.

Not Your Average Cobbler

Seasonal Fruit Tart

This is my rif on a recipe Sean Brock published in the Washington Post a couple of years ago.  Mine has a whole lots less eggs & sugar. You have to make it in two stages, but the good part is the first stage can be done ahead of time. I've made it with apples topped with cinnamin sugar, and last night Alice made it with peaches, and glazed it with plum jam!

BROWNED BUTTER

2 sticks unsalted butter

2 vanilla beans, split lengthwise

1/4 teaspoon salt

Combine the butter, vanilla beans and salt in a medium sauce pan over medium heat. Cook, stirring and watching closely, until the butter browns. Strain through a fine-mesh strainer into a medium bowl and cool to room temperature. Discard the solids.


BATTER
5 large egg yolks
1 cup sugar
1 cup flour·    

In a large mixing bowl whisk together the egg yolks, and then gradually add the browned butter.  Mix the sugar and flour together in a separate bowl. Gradually stir in the sugar/flour mixture.  This will form a thick batter. Pour or shape into greased tart pan.  Arrange fruit to cover it, lightly press down fruit into batter; SEE NOTE.

In a 350 degree oven, bake for 20 minutes, then rotate the dish from front to back. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes longer until the top is golden brown and the filling is just set on the inside. 

NOTE: For apples,  I used about 3 medium, slice in wedges about ¼ inch thick.   Then sprinkle them with cinnamon sugar.

For peaches I used 2 large.

AFTER TART Cools:

2 tablespoons of plum jam

2 teaspoons corn syrup.

Heat plum jam in microwave for about 20 seconds, stir in corn syrup. Lightly brush on tart.




We hope y'all enjoy this!

Break Out the Canner!

Last weekend Alice went down to State Farmers Market to check out what fresh veggies were in. She was mightily impressed with quality and value. We got out our Pressure Canner, asked Mama Glenda to bring down hers, and we washed quart and pint jars.  Then Tuesday I bought the produce. The corn and tomatoes were the best value at $8 a box.  So far we have about 3 dozen quarts of Vegetable Soup and twice that in Tomato Soup!  Alice is using Mama Lucy's recipe for both.  Because it is just the two of us now, she is putting up some in pints,  which we normally use just for fruits and jams. We figure they'd be just right for a weekend trip to the beach, or to let Catherine and Stewart take to school.

Generally,  we often wait for the dad-blamed hottest week summer to do things like this. This week wasn't too bad,  but as luck would have it, our main AC unit went out Wednesday afternoon!  

I'm back! (Mostly)

OK. We had a whole bunch of stuff to do at the beach house this winter/spring,  and no chaps to help us, so we had to go down there a fair amount of February and March.  That took up some time,  and then we had to get ready for my knee surgery, which took more time in April and May. We wound up doing pretty well at the beach and at home.  Anyway,  I'm now 7 weeks out from knee surgery, and normalcy, (or what we know of it!) is slowly returning.  I'm off the pain killers now, but still won't be going back to work for a while due to flexation issues. I've started puttering around in the kitchen, and going through cook books and magazines, while kinda sorta planning for some future events.  


I'm starting back with what's happening here and now, and hopefully  I'll backtrack to earlier this year in the next few weeks.  Maybe I'll be caught up by August!

This week is Corn, Peas, and Squash. Two different friends brought us two different kinds of corn: Bi-Color and Golden Jubilee!  The Bi-Color has the flavor Silver Queen, which as most of you know is outstanding.  We'd never heard of Golden Jubilee, which is a beautiful light yellow ear! My friend says it apparently does not freeze well, which is fine with us, since it eats very well as corn on the cob!  We have plans for it to be a co-star in a Frogmore stew tomorrow! 

Last year I planted a few Patty Pan Squash for the first time. The vine borers and cut worms pretty much left them alone, unlike what they do to my yellow squash and zucchini. This year I planted three varieties: Sunburst, Peter Pan, and Ron De Nice.  These all have flesh that is somewhat dryer than "normal" squash.  We are sauteing them in various ways  with various seasonings, with wonderful results. 

Another new variety on the table this week was Mississippi Silvertip Field Pea!  A friend of Mama Glenda's gave her about half a bushel.  With the inclusion of a ham hock to the pot, and they turned out to be wonderful!  Very creamy and tender, and  were pretty easy to shell, although I can only take credit for about maybe 10% of that. Mama Glenda did most of it. 


    

uh, yeah, I'll be right back.

>>>>>>>>crickets<<<<<<<
Yes, its been a while.  We had very busy spring.  I'll tell you about it RSN.  -Real Soon Now--I promise, I'll be right back!

A Successful Charleston Jaunt!

This past weekend we finally got back to Charleston. We haven’t be able to take a really relaxing weekend there in over a year, which is way too long! We picked up Catherine from CoC on Friday evening and headed toward a place I’d heard about a while back. The Glass Onion, on Highway 17 South. Its locavore kind of place that serves both lunch and dinner at moderate prices. We went kind of wild and gamey, starting with Rabbit Liver & Pickles,  moving on to Sheepshead* & Rutabagas, Duck with Hoppin’John, and Quail with Grits & Greens. We finished up with probably the best bread pudding I’ve had since we were in New Orleans!

Saturday morning we introduced Catherine to a breakfast that we came up with earlier this year. Baked Apples (which are loaded with Walnuts, Raisins & Cinnamon) with a generous side of steel-cut oatmeal, topped with some Greek yogurt. It’s a very good winter comfort-food type of breakfast, just perfect for a screened-in porch on Folly Beach, with a cup of Café du Monde next to it!

With such a breakfast, we didn’t really feel the need for a formal lunch, so we made do with stop by WildFlour Pastry, which I had recently noted in Southern Living and Garden & Gun. As expected, everything was scrumptious! What you see are a Pecan Sticky Bun, a Raspberry Nutella Turnover, and a Scone with Sundried Tomatoes, Pesto & Mozzarella. I had hoped to bring back a pie or three, but I didn’t realize all their pies are made to order. So that’ll have to be for next time we go, or maybe when Catherine is coming back this way.
Saturday afternoon, we stopped by Crosby’s Seafood and picked some fresh local shrimp. Alice and Catherine used them in a wonderful Salad, modifying a recipe that a friend from Charleston gave us years ago. We really should make it more often, for it was delicious!

Sunday Lunch we wound up with some old friends at the Lost Dog Café on Folly Beach, which turned out to be pretty much what you’d expect to find on Folly, (actually a little better.) There was a roaring Sunday Brunch crowd, but we got seated after a not too long wait. The service was good, and the food well done for your money. We’ll go back!

*Sheepshead is a fish.