racheld

Our family has two colors unique to our vernacular, though they may have also passed down through the neighbor family whose matriarch originated them. My Mom used to roll the lady's hair every Saturday on those little bobby pins, covering her hair in paper-twisted curls to look like one of those daisy-clustered swim caps of decades past. The lady liked her hair tinted occasionally, and on one particular Saturday afternoon, bent her head over the sink for Mother to apply the bottled stuff which would render her miraculously beautiful. Mother gazed doubtfully at the vile stuff which flowed onto her scalp and expressed her dismay. Mother told the story afterwards for all her life, quoting Mrs. Moore exactly: "I don't care if it turns it Piss-munkum brown---just so it ain't Piss-alum Green!" Dear Fi, bless your heart, you've achieved both on a plate.

OLD South Contingent checking in---for most of the thread, I thought I'd be the ONLY below-M/D recipe in the bunch. I know it's just a weird Southern thing, and I've been gasped at and EWWWWW'ed on another thread for it, but here it is: Chicken, roasted (now my preference) or of days gone by-- Chicken, poached with chunks of carrot and celery and onion, with a couple of crushed toes of garlic thrown into the pot; Drain and bone the chicken; save all that broth for later, as well as the smooth, creamy, flavourful vegetables for soup or cook's treat. Chop chicken and place in a big bowl. Celery, strung and cut on the diagonal Boiled eggs, chopped Seedless red grapes Diced apple Chopped sweet pickles (preferably homemade lime pickles, or the "cheat" kind, with sliced dills drained, jar filled with sugar and a scatter of cloves and allspice, left in fridge several days to melt into syrup and crisp the pickles Mayonnaise, a good strong brand, such as Duke's or Blue Plate (mixed with about a tablespoon of powdered sugar per cup, with celery seeds scattered in) Toasted pecan halves stirred in just before serving, or toasted sunflower seeds scattered atop This was our most requested party/luncheon/reception recipe, served on lettuce chiffonade or pretty leaves of butter lettuce or parsley (NOT, as one client learned to her regret, on whatever-comes-to-hand-because-it's-pretty-and-abundant. The great sheaves that she gathered from her prolific mint bed, piling a big pillow of them on each plate to receive the servings of chicken salad, so overpowered the whole plate that the entire luncheon tasted like toothpaste. Well, she HAD plenty of mint, and it made a lovely garnish, but this particular party was talked about under hairdryers for a long time after. And I could never eat from Quimper again. Overkill to the extreme. For sandwiches and choux puffs, we always left out the grapes, minced the celery separately, and tossed everything else except pecans into the Cuisinart and gave it a whiz. This is the recipe I remember from my childhood, made by my Mother for countless showers and church doings and morning Coffees. A Coffee-capital-C was a thing unto itself, a morning affair attended by the wives and mothers and young matrons of the community, usually for introducing a visitor or new bride, for fund-raising, for planning committees to show off their best hats, and involved all sorts of polishings and preparations and doilies. And chicken salad was de rigueur for all such gatherings, whether served open-faced on daintily-cut bread, made into fingers, or (fanciest of all) stuffed into choux puffs. And the Southern taste accounted for a couple of tons of the stuff carted out of my kitchen over the years. My sons sat down one day and figured it out in pickup loads (Bubbamath), counting on smoothing off the top with a huge spatula like leveling a flour measure...their calculations then ran to about twelve pickups full. Or would it it be pickupfuls? I've lived up here too long. Something about the amalgamation of the apple, celery, egg, chicken, pickle flavours just is the essence of a teaparty or lovely luncheon on the lawn with white tablecloths and festive umbrellas. And hats.

I think of it all the time---that great tall black one in the Entertaining thread. I vote for that. It's time for another stroll.

Spinidge and strawberries have been a mainstay at Eastern Star, WMU and Garden Club luncheons since before bottled dressing. The usual concoction poured on for tossing is old-fashioned poppyseed dressing, begun by tossing about a quarter of a sweet onion into a blender, along with some vinegar, about five times as much sugar, and some WESSONOIL. Let 'er rip til the whirlpool turns plumb white with the emulsifying---about seven or eight minutes, or til the old Waring starts to give off that hot blender odor usually reserved for the fifth round of daiquiris out on the porch. Throw in a handful of the little black seeds, store in a "covered jar" in the fridge, and use on any kind of salad, usually with one or more fruit components and enhanced by some crisp-toasted pecans scattered atop. Lots of times, the salad was also punctuated by some thin-sliced mushrooms, sliced bottom-to-top at the last minute to preserve their pure whiteness. There was a lovely recipe for this salad in the Southern Living of several years ago, picked up in the dentist's office and smuggled home by me because the salad was served in a woven-bread basket made of the pop-a-can breadsticks. (Well, I DID leave them my copy of the latest Readers' Digest and two Guideposts---somebody enjoyed those, I'm sure--perhaps the stories alleviated a little of their apprehension). Then, when a special houseguest was coming to visit, I couldn't find the darn thing, so we just had the salad in a cut-glass bowl. I remembered that it involved two cans of breadsticks and a pam-sprayed stainless bowl (more if you wanted a lid), and one of the recipes involved adding chicken, but I haven't tried yet to build the bowl.

The wondering is over, and the withdrawal pangs have subsided. This will be a great week of smoking, and I hope I can get a chance to read along once I tell Chris the subject. He'll be here looking every day.

People pay Miss Martha a FORTUNE for that exact shade of paint. And even more to the painters for that stippled effect.

When my children were growing up, we carried a can of Showboats and a can opener on every family picnic. But I have to fish out that piece of floaty fat soon as I open the can. I think pork and beans must be the only food on the market that's allowed to name the smallest ingredient first.

Beautiful Susan, and it even SOUNDS so grand. And what better to go with breakfast than oatmeal and milk?

What she said. I've gotten addicted to dirty Marys, with all the above, vodka straight from the freezer, a sloosh of olive juice into the pitcher and several fat stuffed ones scattered over ice cubes in the glass. That's just my Southern raisin'. Almost everything has to be OVER ice; Nigella's room-temp Marys just didn't appeal to me, keeping the flavours keen notwithstanding. And Welcome!!!

Thank you, Lori; what a lovely thing to say. All these omelets and eggs and those crisp golden chunks of potato bathed in that velvety Hollandaise!! And all the fruits-- Percy, only you would arrange such a provocative tableau on a tabletop, the cantaloupe slices curled together in such luscious abandon--and such a beautiful table--that wood pattern is priceless. Susan, I have the same amount of rhubarb lying crisply in my fridge--I bought four beautiful long stalks, intending to make a bit of sauce in honor of Klary's blog, and haven't yet. Klary, are you listening? Post the muffin recipe pronto, please, before my rhubarb is past its expiration date. And Megan, your "just downstairs" supply of those gorgeous croissants!! No wonder you love New York. The nodding tulips were a lovely note to start my morning. And THIS one has me wanting to go dust off my passport: I'd say exquisitely DIVE-able, but it would be a sin to disturb that feathery masterpiece. WHATEVER is in that cup, you just know it's gonna be divine!!

Two BIG cups of cap for me, as Chris slept in til almost noon...he and the crew worked a big project yesterday and on into the night. I woke him with the aroma of maple bacon, and he wandered sleepily into the kitchen as I broke the first egg into the dish for the French Toast batter. It was a HUGE egg, and two small golden yolks fell into the bowl. I showed it to him and set it aside in another bowl to cook for him, for good luck for the day. The toast was three small croissants, sliced in half and soaked in an egg-milk batter scented with vanilla...sizzled in a little peanut oil til puffy and golden, snowed with powdered sugar, with a drizzle of maple syrup. The stuff always tastes better out of a little house-shaped can. He also had butter-fried eggs with creamy grits, into which he stirred the soft-cooked egg yolks, after trimming off the whites for me. Fruit yogurt for dessert.

Yep---keep at least one of each in the upstairs fridge at all times---two of peaches and mango... And I FORGOT the pretty party thing!! I remember unwrapping one once at a very nice client's house, and not even getting the caviar on top, before she was slicing into that thing with a big egg-turner that took out a huge piewedge. Though it would have served about six, spread on baguettes or toasts, she ate it with a spoon, and only a deft sidestep on my part kept her from plunging her spoon also into the caviar tub. I served her out a nice portion with a clean utensil as I topped the "cake." Use a straight-sided mold, at least 6" deep; outline a circle of waxed paper by tracing around the bottom of mold, cut and line mold. Layers: At least an inch of filling per layer: A good thick egg salad, with or without chopped stuffed olives. A layer of avocado, chunked from the shell, tossed gently with lime and salt (cilantro optional) and packed gently on top of egg. Softened cream cheese with a little creme fraiche and salt beaten in; snipped lox or a couple of tablespoons of salmon caviar stirred gently in Avocado layer Egg salad layer You can chill between layerings if the fillings are a bit smushy...a good clean line is nice, if you can maintain the layers Chill overnight or up to 24 hours. Run a thin blade around inside of mold, all the way to the bottom(cake-frosting spatula is nice and straight for this). Invert onto serving platter (looks spectacular on a footed crystal cakeplate), peel off waxed paper and smooth top. Frost top with several ounces of salmon caviar. Or make rosettes over top with more of the creamcheese layer (without caviar). Top rosettes with your favorite caviar, letting it dribble lavishly down the little hills. Even better with oil-brushed bruschetta, no garlic. Transport it to party IN the mold.

I her dat, GRITS girl!

Not ANYWHERE on the level of a lost pot of stock, mind you, but I HAD been outside cleaning the kitchen windows, so maybe it's suitable for this thread. I came in, brushes and towels and phone and big newly-filled spray bottle of Windex in hand. Macaw, spying bottle, immediately began mentioning "shower" in as many inflections or dialects as he knows. His shower is always of as-hot-as-it-can-get-from-the-tap, so as not to blast him with a cold spray, and besides, by the time it goes through the mister part, it's a perfect warm temp. So, I turned on the faucet in "his" kitchen, unscrewed the spray top, dumped the bottle, and just as he was chuckling, "shower---getcha arms up!" for the umpteenth time and the steam was beginning to rise from the sink, I watched the last of my quart of Windex gurgle down the drain Happy, drippy bird.

You put avocado and Eagle brand over crushed ice, moodge it around, and eat? Is the crunchy ice part of the charm? Trying to get my mind around all that rich mouthful. Welcome!!! Love your sheep-shoes. Somewhere---my few feeble brain cells remaining say maybe MFK Fisher?---there's a mention of seeing the same older gentleman in his favourite cafe day after day, finishing his mannerly meal, then being presented a halved avocado, a little bowl of powdered sugar, and a spoon. He would himself do the moodging, gently adding sugar and creaming it together inside one shell--one only; the other always remained untouched on the plate---and then, when it was of the required sweetness and consistency, he would eat it daintily as his dessert. The thought of the combination has never appealed to me, but as I had read this passage several times SOMEWHERE, I googled "avocado Powdered Sugar" and the first of many were recipes for buttercreams and desserts and such cloyingly sweet combinations. And in Edna Ferber's Giant, there's a little moment at a lunch party between the hostess and the always-ready-to-eat wealthy neighbor, Vashti Hake: "Avocados stuffed with crabmeat to begin with!! Oh, My!" You could almost see the heart-smilies in the air. And I, child of the behind-the-trends South, had no reference in which to frame what that might taste or even LOOK like. But I longed to try some, and as soon as I spotted an avocado for sale in a store, I did, though I was just a beginning cook. We were in a little beachside motel in Biloxi, one of those stay-a-week places which come "furnished"--said title encompassing a TV, two beds, a two-burner stove, a table and chairs, one soup pot and four plates. We dangled chicken livers from the bridge into the water, catching crab after crab, and when we had several pounds, we cooked them, with several dried red peppers brought from home and a generous handful of salt. I would not stay in the kitchen as they went to their demise, but peeked into the pot later to see the rich pinks and salmons and golds of their hot little shells---I can still see the halves of lemon bobbing in that big pan of seething, delicious aromas. Daddy and I spent HOURS cleaning them. Of course, all of us had many nibbles and samples and dips into the still-warm, sweet meat as we worked. We'd brought garbage bags and a week's worth of old newspapers, which we spread on the picnic table outside our shady "cabin" and I remember the hot day, the sun glinting off the Gulf, which was RIGHT THERE, sighing and sushing as we picked crab on that memorable afternoon. We'd bought the first two avocados we'd ever seen, and chilled them for a bit in the tiny fridge, along with a stirred-up remoulade awaiting the tumble of crab into the round steel pan. I remember cracked pepper and a little horseradish, a generous shake of "chili" sauce from its distinctively-shaped bottle, a gloop or two of mayonnaise, a little grating of the peel of that brine-destined lemon before it went into the pot. I stirred, scooped the mixture equally into the four neat halves. Someone, somewhere had told me about whacking the pit with a knife, so I remember the flush of accomplishment and know-how as I flung the pits into the garbage with the shake of the knife. I know we had a box of Premium Saltines---I remember a sleeve of those on the freshly-newspapered outdoor table, along with more cut lemon, the plates holding those precious new creations on a big bed of chopped iceberg, with all the extra crab salad in another bowl. I remember grabbing soap and a towel, then we ran down the hot sand to stand kneedeep in the water, washing our hands and arms and faces of the crabby remains before we sat down to our hard-earned meal. The paper was immediately ringed with the drips from two icy beers and two Cokes, all just pulled from a big plastic bucket holding water of arctic temperatures, chilled with more of the motel's ice than they would have liked to provide. The last of my crumbly lemon bars, made at home and transported in a flat Tupperware, were our dessert, as we all four drank the strong sweet stove-perked coffee in the velvety beachdark. Surely there was more than just that on the table that evening, but that's lost to time, eclipsed by that lovely discovery, that longed-for taste which lived up to its literary advertisement and its long awaiting. Avocados stuffed with crabmeat. Oh, my.

Wake up!!! Fresser!! They're calling from your work to see where you are. You've been in that fetal position since this time yesterday, mumbling about "Fire Engine Red" and "Cherries in the Snow." Snap out of that lipstick-daze before we have to hose you down.

A Caker might be persuaded, given the right recipe...

You USED the sig line!! (In saccharine-laden Julia Roberts Southern Accent re: the radio station: "You BAWWWWD it!!!) Even Jack would love it. eta: Upon re-reading, I've been cursed with the echo of, "You can't HANDLE the soup!!"

Don't forget that your insistence is MUCH more forbidding with a big purse over one arm and an impatiently-tapping high-heeled shoe.

Not closed yet, so Good Morning from the cloudy Heartland...you're a bright ray of sunshine. It was SO GOOD to visit with you this week!!!

Last word before this closes: I bought the first four stalks of rhubarb of my LIFE yesterday...long rosy crisp ones...gonna make something in your honor.

I'm so GLAD Foufou is HOME!! And I think I'm glad I didn't know at the time she was missing---our Georgia Granddog, who lived with us for a year and a half, was missing for several days last month, and it gave me a PAIN in the tummy til she was found. Our PeePee rat did that once, got out of her aquarium and disappeared for most of a day...we heard her later, walking her tiny claws clickety on the magazines at Chris' side of the bed. And once she got out of it in the backseat of the car as we traveled, made her way underneath the front seat, and appeared, shining whitely in the dark between his feet as he drove. (But not before she chewed a big ravel out of the cloth cover of my much-coveted Martha Stewart wedding book lying on the backseat, the little minx). Entertained herself, then went exploring. Thanks for all the happy week with you---must be getting on toward quittin' time for your blog, and we just loved this peek into your happy, busy, interesting life. Post more pics ANYWHERE!!! rachel

The Amsterdam GRITS girl cooked pulled pork for her birthday last week. Not pitted or grilled, mind you---it's a kitchen version, and it looks GOOOOD. See "Foodblog: Chufi" which ends today. We had two mahogany chickens and some meaty rib bits last night, straight off the Weber. I love being married to a man who likes FIRE. I also have to get an E-greeting off to my sister for her birthday today---she's a wholehearted GRITS girl---went to Ole Miss, would raise a rebel flag over her Texas spread if she could, has pictures of Robert E. Lee and maybe Stonewall Jackson on her LIVING ROOM walls, spent a week in Salt Lake City searching out every first and last cousin to make her provenance to that DoC thing, and still thinks of her sorority sisters as blood kin. Every room in the house has paintings of magnolias and steamboats, and her Hispanic housekeeper can make a mean pitcher of sweet tea, presenting it with a "Here y'all go," that would make proud the matron of any Garden Club in Mississippi. Her little mop of a dog is named Katie Scarlett, she thinks of grits and cornbread as a vegetable, and has her tomato crop in the ground before the tinsel's off the tree. Let's just say Sis would jump right into the Eastern Star if they'd only change the direction. I better write her, bless her heart.

Can you hear THIS big mouth mumbling "mjum" from WAY over HERE? (Except for the herring, of course---but what is in the snifter beside the sandwich? Looks like a cross between fortune cookies and those teensy finger-bananas). Our GRITS girl made pulled pork for her birthday!! And the dinner out---were those all the courses, or did you snap pics of everyone's order? The eel was particularly intriguing--though I don't care for it myself, my dear neighbor, who lived in Germany until she was a teen, speaks of it SO longingly from time to time. She and her Mother ate whatever they could manage during the Forties, and she remembers it as a special treat. Does it come canned? I think I'll look online for some---she'll be 80 in June, and I'm doing her a teaparty. Those pics of the pastries!! The shine reached way into my very cloudy Monday morning. I tell myself if I went into one of those shops, I'd choose and point and take 'til my basket was full. Then I tell myself "You can MAKE those," and go my way with just a couple. It's like looking into Tiffany's jewelry window. No wonder Holly liked breakfast there. The DOWN spot is the reminder that it's almost the end. But you've gotta get the proper use of that new camera---just keep snapping and sending on any and every thread. This has been wonderful.

Dear Heavens!! All this time I thought we were reading about a grownup lady with a husband and career and VERY advanced cooking skills. We must have been misinformed, though the cooking is indisputable. How OLD are you???? Twelve?? All that food, all that blogging---there's gotta be a staff of dozens behind your teenage self, doing all that ADULT work. Or a portrait moldering somewhere in an attic, Ms. Gray. Looks like a fabulous birthday!!! It's delightful to have been invited. rachel